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THE LIBRARY 
OF 
THE UNIVERSITY 
OF CALIFORNIA 
LOS ANGELES 





ANNE DILLON | 
i GIFT OF 
j 


Mrs. Helen A. Dillon 


Mirbeau. ‘This 1s wnat me suze 


“He is a literary explorer. - - The rare 
charm of tenderness is his. . - In his 
novels we find strong, violent strokes, an 
extreme irony; but his pages are filled with 
an emotion which avows, as if regretfully, 
the nobility and lofty desires” of a soul 
imprisoned in the reserve of its youth.” 


And another critic thus paints him: 


“A masterly and vigorous writer, gifted 
with an extraordinary power of expression, 
an enthusiast, an unexampled evoker of 
nature, stirred by the physical sensations 
which human beings and inanimate things 
give him, equally capable of lifting us to a 
world of poetry Of of hurling us into abys- 
mal depths; always 2 man of the first water, 
battling against all the spectres of life; and. 


me Set OES 





exaggeration. In its remarkable pages, Octave 

Mirbeau, who has been characterized as “the 
Don Juan of the Ideal,” pours the tumultuous passion 
of a Byronically sensitive soul. It is filled with pity, 
it trembles with poetry and is extraordinary by reason 
of its wave of sublime eloquence. Yet it is a simple 
story, the story of a love for a wilful woman, but the 
striking character which distinguishes it lies in the 
clear, unmatched impressions of the love. 


4 (oe can be called a masterpiece without 


Jean Mintie, the hero, is an analyst of the soul 
who cannot experience an action without dissecting it, 
a man of feeling who recklessly surrenders himself to 
his love, at once frenzied and intelligent; a man neither 
foolish nor an imbecile, who yet permits himself to be 
dragged to the depths of vice and crime for his sweet- 
heart. The description of Mintie’s reaction to war is 
masterly in its realism. 


. The book has undeniable charm —a powerful, 
sweeping narrative. It is the record of a man crucified 
by his love. 





CALVARY 


Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2007 with funding from 
Microsoft Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/calvaryanovel0Omirbiala 











CALVARY 


(A Novel) 


By Octave Mirbeau 
Member of the Goncourt Academy 


Translated by Louis Rich 





New York 
Lieber & Lewis 


MCMXXII 

















CopyricHr, 1922, 
By LIEBER & LEWIS 


PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 


Collere CALVARY 


Library 


PQ 
2364 


MTCIZE 


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CHAPTER I 


- les-Hétres, a small town in the department of Orne, 
and I was immediately christened by the name of 
Jean-Frangois-Marie-Mintié. To celebrate in a fitting 
manner my coming into this world, my godfather, who 
was my uncle, distributed a lot of dainties, threw many 
coppers and other small coins to a crowd of country 
boys gathered on the church steps. One of them, 
while struggling with his comrades, fell so awkwardly 
on the sharp edge of a stone that he broke his neck 
and died the following day. As for my uncle, when 
he returned home he contracted typhoid fever and 
passed away a few weeks later. My governess, old 
Marie, often related these incidents to me with pride 
and admiration. 

Saint-Michel-les-Hétres is situated on the outskirts 
of a great national forest, the Tourouvre forest. Al- 
though it counts fifteen hundred inhabitants, it makes 
no more noise than is made in the fields on a calm 
day by the trees, the grass, the corn. A grove of giant 
beech trees, which turn purple in autumn, shields it 
from the northern winds, and the houses with pentile 
roofs, descending the declivity of the hill, extend far 
out until they meet the great valley, broad and always 
green, where one can see straying herds of oxen. The 
Huisne River, glittering under the sun, winds and 
loses itself in the meadows which are separated by 
rows of tall poplars. Dilapidated tanneries, small wind- 
mills scale its course, clearly visible among clumps of 
alders. On the other side of the valley are cultivated 
fields with straight lines of fences and apple trees 


| WAS born one evening in October at Saint-Michel- 


6 CALVARY 


scattered here and there. The horizon is enlivened by 
small pink farms, by hamlets one can see here and 
there in the midst of the verdure which appears almost 
black. Because of the proximity of the woods, the 
sky is alive with crows and yellow-beaked jackdaws 
coming and going at all seasons. 

Our family lived on the outskirts of the town, op- 
posite a church, very old and tottering, an ancient and 
curious structure which was called the Priory —an 
annex of an Abbey which was destroyed during the 
Revolution and of which were left not more than two 
or three faces of a crumbled wall covered with ivy. I 
recall clearly but without tenderness the smallest de- 
tails of the places where my childhood was spent. I 
recall the iron gate in a neglected condition which 
opened with a creaking sound into a large court 
adorned by a scurfy grass plot, two shabby looking 
sorbs visited by blackbirds, some chestnut trees, very 
old and with such large trunks that the arms of four 
men could not reach around them— my father used 
to tell this with pride to every visitor. I recall the 
house with its brick walls, grim and crusty; its semi- 
circular steps beautified by geraniums; its irregular 
windows which looked like holes; its roof, very steep, 
ending in a weather-cock, which in a breeze made a 
sound like an owl. Behind the house, I remember, 
was a basin where muddy wake-robins were bathing 
or small carps with white scales were playing. I recall 
the sombre curtain of fir trees which hid the commons 
from view, the back yard, the study which my father 
built on the edge of the road skirting the property in 
such a manner that the coming and going of clients 
and clerks did not disturb the quiet of the household. 
I recall the park, its enormous trees, strangely twisted, 
eaten up by polypes and moss, joined together by 
tangled lianas, and the alleys never raked, where worn- 


CALVARY 7 


out stone benches rose up here and there like ancient 
tombs. And I also remember myself, a sickly child, 
in a smock frock of lustring, running across this gloom 
of forsaken things, lacerating myself in the blackberry 
bush, torturing the animals in the backyard or for 
entire days sitting in the kitchen and watching Felix 
who served as our gardener, valet, and coachman. 

Years and years have passed. Everything that I 
loved is now dead. Everything that I knew has taken 
on a new appearance. The church has been rebuilt. 
It now has an embellished doorway, arched windows, 
fancy gutter-spouts representing flaming mouths of 
demons; its new brick belfry laughs gaily into the 
blue; in place of the old house there now rises an 
elaborate Swiss cottage built by the new proprietor 
who, in the enclosure, has increased the number of 
colored glass balls, small cascades and plaster statues 
of Love, soiled by rain. But things and people are 
engraved so profoundly upon my memory that time 
could not apply a burnisher hard enough to erase them. 

I want, from now on, to speak of my parents not as 
I knew them when I was a child, but such as they 
would appear to me now, completed by memory, 
humanized, so to speak, by intimacy and revelation, in 
all the crudity of life, in all the immediacy of impres- 
sion which the inexorable experiences of life lend to 
persons too unhesitatingly loved and too closely 
known. 

My father was a notary public. Since time imme- 
morial it had been so with the Mintié family. It would 
have appeared monstrous, almost revolutionary, if a 
member of the Mintié family had dared to break this 
family tradition and had renounced the scutcheons of 
gilt wood which were transmitted religiously from 
one generation to another like some title of nobility. 
At Saint-Michel-les-Hétres and the surrounding coun- 


8 CALVARY 


try, my father occupied a position which ancestral 
pride, his dignified manners of a country gentleman, 
and, above all, his income of twenty thousand francs 
rendered very important, almost unshakeable. Mayor 
of Saint-Michel, member of the general council, acting 
justice of the peace, vice president of the agricultural 
commission, member of numerous agronomic and for- 
estry societies, he did not overlook any of the petty or 
ambitious honors which carry with them a sort of 
prestige and influence. He was an excellent man, 
very honest and very gentle,—with a mania for kill- 
ing. He could not see a bird, a cat, an insect — any- 
thing at all that was alive — without being seized 
with a strange desire to kill it. He waged a relentless 
trapper’s war on blackbirds, goldfinches, chaffinches 
and bullfinches. Felix was instructed to let my father 
know as soon as a bird appeared in our garden, and 
my father would leave everything — clients, business, 
his meal —to kill the bird. He would often lie in 
wait for hours, motionless, behind a tree on which the 
gardener had pointed out a little blueheaded titmouse. 
During his walks, every time he noticed a bird on a 
branch and did not have his rifle with him, he would 
throw his cane at it, never failing to say, “ Oh, hang 
it! He was there this morning!” or “Hang it! I 
must have missed him for sure, it’s too far.” These 
were the only thoughts which birds ever inspired in 
him. 

-He was also greatly engrossed with cats. When- 
ever he recognized the trail of a cat he could not rest 
until he discovered and killed it. Sometimes on a 
moonlight night he would get up, go out with his gun 
and stay outside till dawn. You should have seen 
him, musket on shoulder, holding by the tail the ca- 
daver of a cat, bleeding and motionless! Never have 
I. admired anything so heroic; and David on killing 


CALVARY 9 


Goliath must have had no more intoxicated an air of 
triumph! With a majestic gesture he threw the cat 
at the feet. of the cook who said, “Oh! the nasty 
beast!” and thereupon started to cut it up, saving the 
meat for the beggars, leaving the skin to dry on the 
end of a stick, later to be sold at Auvergnats. If I 
dwell so much on details of a seemingly unimportant 
character, it is because during all my life I was ob- 
sessed with and haunted by these feline episodes of 
my childhood. There is one among them which has 
left such an impression on my spirit that to this very 
day, in spite of all the years that have gone by and all 
the sorrows that I have experienced, not a day passes 
without my thinking of it sadly. 

One afternoon father and I were walking in the 
garden. My father carried a long stick ending in an 
iron skewer, by means of which he unearthed snails 

"and limaxes that were eating up the plants. Suddenly 
on the edge of the basin we noticed a little kitten 
drinking. We hid behind a thick shrub. 

“ Child,” my father said in a low voice, “go quickly, 
fetch my musket and come back. Be careful the cat 
does not see you.” 

And squatting down, he moved apart the twigs of 
the shrub so that he might observe every movement 
of the kitten which, resting on its forelegs, its neck 
drawn out and wagging its tail, was lapping the water 
in the basin and turning its head from time to time 
to lick its mouth and scratch its neck. 

“Come on,” repeated my father, “ be off!” I pitied 
the little kitten. It was so pretty with its tawny fur 
striped with silky black, its supple and graceful move- 
ments and its tongue, like the petal of a rose, which 
pumped water! I would have liked to disobey my 
father, I even thought of making a noise, I wanted to 
cough, to brush the twigs apart rudely in order to 


£ 


10 CALVARY 


warn the poor animal of the danger ahead. But my 
father looked at me with eyes so severe that I walked 
away in the direction of the house. Pretty soon I 
came back with the musket. The kitten was still 
there, confident and gay. It had finished drinking. 
Sitting on its back, its ears pricked up and eyes shin- 
ing, it was following the flight of a butterfly in the 
air. Oh, what a moment of unspeakable anguish that 
was for me! My heart was beating so powerfully 
that I feared I was going to faint. 

“Papa! Papa!” I shouted. At the same time a 
sharp report was heard, which sounded like the crack 
of a whip. 

“ Damned rascal!” my father swore. 

He aimed again. I saw his finger pull the trigger; 
quickly I shut my eyes and stopped my ears. Bang!! 
....and I heard a mewing, at first plaintive and then 
sorrowful, oh, so sorrowful that one might have said 
it was the cry of a child. And the little kitten jumped, 
writhed, pawed the grass and did not stir any more. 

Of an absolutely mediocre mind, tender hearted, 
though he seemed indifferent to everything which did 
not appeal to his vanity or did not affect his profes- 
sional interests, lavish of counsel, ready to render aid, 
conservative, of graceful carriage and gay, my father 
justly enjoyed the respect of everybody. My mother, 
a young woman of the nobility, had brought no for- 
tune with her as a dowry; instead, she had brought 
with her powerful connections, a closer alliance with 
the petty aristocracy of the country, which was con- 
sidered just as useful as an increment in cash or an 
acquisition of land. Although his powers of observa- 
tion were very limited and he did not boast of any 
ability to read souls as well as he could read a marriage 
contract or explain the legal points of a testament, my 
father very soon realized the difference of birth, edu- 


CALVARY 11 


cation and temperament which separated him from his 
wife. 

Whether or not in the beginning he felt hurt on 
that score, I do not know; at any rate he never 
showed it. He resigned himself to it. Between him, 
who was rather awkward, ignorant and indifferent,— 
and her, who was educated, refined and emotional, 
there was a chasm which he never for a moment tried 
to bridge, having neither the desire nor the ability to do 
so. This moral situation of two beings united for all 
time, whom no community of thought and aspiration 
ever brought in close contact with each other, did not 
in the least trouble my father who considered himself 
satisfied if he found the house well managed, the meals 
well regulated, his habits and idiosyncrasies well re- 
spected. To my mother, on the other hand, this con- 
dition was very painful and made her heart heavy. 

My mother was not beautiful, not even good looking, 
but there was so much simple dignity in her carriage, 
so much natural gracefulness in her movements, an 
expression of such broad kindness on her lips, some- 
what pale, and in her eyes which by turns changed 
their color like the skies in April and shone like a 
sapphire, a smile so caressing, so sad, so humble, that 
one overlooked her forehead which was a little too 
high, swelling out under spots of hair irregularly 
planted, her nose all too large and her skin which was 
ash-colored and metal-like in appearance and which 
at times had an eruption of pimples on it. In her 
presence, as one of her old friends often told me, and 
as since then I sorrowfully realized myself, one felt 
at first slightly affected, then gradually carried away 
and finally violently possessed by a strange feeling of 
sympathy in which there was mingled a sort of affec- 
tionate respect, a vague desire, pity, and a longing to 
offer oneself as a sacrifice for her. Despite her physical 


12 CALVARY 


imperfections or rather because of these very imper- 
fections, she possessed the sad and irresistible charm 
which is given to certain creatures privileged by mis- 
fortune, and around whom there floats an atmosphere 
of something irreparable. Her childhood and her early 
youth were periods of illness and were marked by 
some disquieting nervous fits. But it was hoped that 
marriage, in modifying the conditions of her existence, 
would restore her health which the physicians believed 
was suffering only from an excessive sensitiveness. It 
was not so at all. Marriage, on the contrary, only 
developed the morbid tendencies that were in her, 
and her sensitiveness was heightened to such a degree 
that, among other alarming symptoms, my poor 
mother could not stand the slightest odor, without 
being thrown into a fit, which always ended in a 
swoon. Of what did she suffer? Why these melan- 
cholic fits, these prostrations, which left her huddled 
up on the lounge for entire days, motionless and sullen 
like an old paralytic? Why these tears which would 
suddenly choke her throat to suffocation and for hours 
roll from her eyes in burning streams? Why this dis- 
gust with everything, which nothing could overcome: 
neither distractions nor prayers? She could not tell, for 
she herself did not know. . . Of the causes of her phy- 
sical ailments, her mental tortures, her hallucinations 
which filled her heart and brains with a passionate de- 
sire to die, she knew nothing. She knew not why one 
evening as she sat in front of the glowing fireplace, 
she was suddenly seized with a horrible temptation 
to roll on the fire grate, to deliver her body over to the 
kisses of the flame which called her, fascinated her, 
sang to her hymns of unknown love. Nor did she 
know why on another day, while taking a stroll in the 
country and noticing a man walking in a half-mowed 
meadow with his scythe on the shoulder, she ran to- 


CALVARY 13 


wards him with outstretched arms, shouting “ Death, 
O blessed death, take me, carry me away!” No, she 
knew not the cause or reason for all that. What she 
did know was that at such moments the image of her 
mother, her dead mother, was always before her, the 
image of her mother whom she herself, one Sunday 
morning, had found hanging from the chandelier in 
the parlor. And she again beheld the dead body which 
oscillated slowly in the air, she saw the face all black, 
the eyes all white and without pupils, she saw every- 
thing up to the sunbeam which, penetrating through 
the closed shutters, illuminated with a tragic light the 
tongue, stuck out, and the swollen lips. This anguish, 
these frenzies, this yearning for death, her mother had 
no doubt transmitted to her when she gave life to her; 
it is from her mother’s side that she drew, it is from 
her mother’s breast that she drank the poison, this 
poison which now filled her veins, with which her 
flesh was permeated, which fuddled her brain, which 
gnawed at her soul. During the intervals of calm 
which grew less frequent as the days, months and 
years passed by, she often thought of these things; 
and brooding over her life, recalling its remotest inci- 
dents and comparing the physical resemblances be- 
tween the mother who died voluntarily and the daugh- 
ter who wished to die, she felt more and more upon 
her the crushing weight of this lugubrious inheritance. 
She exalted in and completely abandoned herself to 
the idea that it was impossible for her to resist the 
fate of her ancestors who appeared to her as a long 
chain of suicides emerging from the depth of night, 
far in the past, and extending over ages to terminate 
... Where? At this question her eyes became troubled, 
her temples grew moist with a cold sweat and her 
hands gripped her throat as if striving to grasp the 
imaginary cord, the loop of which she felt was bruis- 


14 CALVARY 


ing her neck and choking her. Every object seemed 
to her an instrument of fatal death; everything re- 
minded her of the image of death, decomposed and 
bleeding ; the branches of the trees appeared to her as 
so many sinister gibbets, and in the green water of the 
fish pond, among the reeds and water lilies, in the 
river shaded by tall herbage, she distinguished the 
floating form covered with slime. 

In the meantime my father, squatted behind some 
thick shrub, musket in hand, was watching a cat or 
bombarding some vocalizing warbler hidden in the 
branches. In the evening, by way of consolation he 
would gently say to mother, “ Well, dearie, your health 
is not always good. You see, what you need is some 
bitters, take some bitters. A glass in the morning, a 
glass in the evening.... That’s all that’s needed.” He 
did not complain of anything, he never got excited 
over anything. Seating himself at his desk, he would 
go over the papers which were brought to him by the 
city clerk during the day and sign them rapidly with 
an air of disdain. “ Here!” he would exclaim, “ it is 
just like this corrupt administration; it would do a 
whole lot better if it occupied itself with the farmer 
instead of pestering us with these small matters. . . . 
Here is some more silly stuff!” ... Then he would go 
to bed, repeating in a calm voice: “ Bitters, take some 
bitters.” 

This resignation hurt my mother like a reproach. 
Although my father’s education was rather limited 
and though she did not find in him any trace of that 
masculine tenderness or fanciful romanticism of which 
she had dreamed, she nevertheless could not deny his 
physical energy and a sort of moral vigor which she 
envied in him, despising as she did its application to 
things which she considered petty and sordid. She 
felt guilty toward herself, guilty toward life so use- 


CALVARY 15 


lessly wasted in tears. Not only did she not meddle 
in the affairs of her husband, but little by little she 
lost her interest even in household duties, leaving them 
to the whims of the servants. She took so little care 
of herself that her chambermaid, good old Marie, who 
was present at her birth, often had to nurse and feed 
her, while scolding her affectionately, as one does 
a little infant in the cradle. In her desire for isolation 
she came to a point where she could no longer stand 
the presence of her parents, of her friends who, dis- 
comfited and repelled by her countenance more and 
more morose, by this mouth whence no word ever 
came, by this forced smile which was immediately 
shrivelled by an involuntary trembling of her lips,— 
called less and less frequently and ended by forgetting 
altogether the path leading to the Priory. Religion, 
like everything else, became a burden to her. She no 
longer put in an appearance in the church, did not 
pray any more, and two Easters passed without any- 
one seeing her approach the holy table. 

Then my mother began to lock herself up in her 
room, the shutters of which she closed, and drew the 
curtains together, deepening the darkness about her. 
She used to spend entire days there, sometimes 
stretched out on a lounge, sometimes kneeling in a 
corner, her head touching the wall. And she was an- 
noyed by the least noise from outside; the slamming 
of the door, the creaking of old shoes along the cor- 
ridor, the neighing of a horse in the court came to 
disturb her novitiate of non-existence. Alas! What 
could be done about it! For a long time she had 
struggled against an unknown disease, and the dis- 
ease, stronger than she was, had felled her to the 
ground. Now her will-power was paralyzed. She 
was no longer free to rise or act. Some mysterious 
force held her in chains, rendering her arms inert, her 


16 CALVARY 


brain muddled, her heart vacillating like a little smoky 
flame beaten by the wind; and far from resisting, she 
looked for added opportunities to plunge deeper into 
suffering, relishing with a sort of perverted exultation 
the frightful delights of her self-annihilation. 

Dissatisfied with the management of his domestic 
affairs, my father at length decided to take an interest 
in the progress of my mother’s illness, which passed 
his understanding. He had the hardest time in the 
world to make mother accept the idea of going to 
Paris to consult the “ princes of science” as he put it. 
It was a sorry trip. Of the three celebrated physicians 
to whom he took her, the first declared that my mother 
was anemic and prescribed a strengthening diet; the 
second diagnosed that she was affected with nervous 
rheumatism and prescribed a debilitating regimen; the 
third one found that “it was nothing” and recom- 
mended mental tranquility. 

No one saw clearly into her soul. She herself did 
not know it. Obsessed with the cruel memory to 
which she attributed all her misfortunes, she could 
not unravel with clearness all that stirred obscurely 
in the innermost depths of her being, nor understand 
the vague passions, the imprisoned aspirations, the 
captive dreams which had accumulated in her since 
childhood. She was like a nestling bird that, without 
realizing the obscure and nostalgic forces which drew 
it toward heaven of which it has no knowledge, 
crushes its head and maims its wings against the cage 
bars. Instead of craving death as she thought she 
was, her soul within her, just like that bird that hun- 
gered for the unknown skies, hungered for life radiant 
with tenderness, filled with love; and just like that 
bird, was dying from this unassuaged hunger. As a 
child, she gave herself entirely, with all the exaggera- 
tions of her fervid nature, to the love for material 


. 


| 


CALVARY 17 


things and animals; as a young girl she was given to 
love of dreams of the impossible, but material objects 
never brought her peace, nor did her dreams assume a 
precise and soothing form. She had no one to guide 
her, no one to set right this youthful mind already 
shaken by internal shocks, no one to open the door 
of this heart to wholesome reality, a door already 
guarded by chimeric shadows in her vacant state; no 
one to whom she could pour out the exuberance of 
her thoughts, her tenderness, her desires, which find- 
ing no outlet for expansion, accumulated, boiled with- 
in her, ready to burst the fragile mould poorly pro- 
tected by nerves too jaded. 

Her mother, always ill, singularly absorbed in that 
hypochondria which was soon to kill her, was inca- 
pable of intelligent and firm direction in the matter of 
her daughter’s education. Her father, all but ruined, 
put to his last shift, struggled hard to save for his 
family its ancestral home which was threatened; and 
among the young people about her — shiftless noble- 
men, vainglorious burghers, greedy peasants, none 
bore upon his brow the magic star which could lead 
her to her God. Everything she heard, everything 
she saw seemed to be in disagreement with her own 
manner of understanding and feeling. To her, the sun 
did not appear red enough, the nights pale enough, 
the skies deep enough. Her fleeting conception of 
things and beings condemned her fatally to a perversion 
of her senses, to vagaries of the spirit and left her 
nothing but the torment of an unachieved longing, the 
torture of unfulfilled desires. And later her marriage 
which had been more than a sacrifice—a business 
transaction, a compromise to improve the straitened 
circumstances of her father! . .. And her disgust, her 
revolt at feeling herself a piece of dishonored flesh, 
a prey, an instrument of man’s pleasure! To have 


18 CALVARY 


soared so high and to fall so low! To have dreamed 
of celestial kisses, of mystic caresses and divine pos- 
sessions and then... the end of it!... Instead of wide 
expanses, ablaze with light, where her imagination 
felt at home among the soaring flights of angels in a 
trance of joy and affrighted doves — there came night, 
thick, sinister and haunted by the spectre of her 
mother, stumbling over tombs and crosses with a 
piece of cord on her neck. 

The Priory soon grew silent. On the gravel of its 
alleys one no longer heard the trundle of carts and 
carriages bringing friends of the neighborhood to the 
front entrance decorated with geraniums. The front 
gate was bolted in order to make the carriages go 
through the back yard. In the kitchen the servants 
talked among themselves in low voices, moving about 
on tiptoe as is done in a house where some one has 
died. The gardener, by order of my mother who could 
not stand the noise of wheelbarrows and the scraping 
of rakes on the ground, allowed the wild stock to suck 
up the sap of the rose bushes turned yellow, allowed 
the weeds to choke the flowers in the baskets and to 
cover up the walks. And the house with its dark 
curtain of fir trees resembling a funeral canopy which 
sheltered it from the west, with its windows always 
closed, with its living corpse which it guarded buried 
behind its square walls of old brick looked like a burial 
vault. The country folk who on Sunday used to take 
a stroll-in the woods, no longer passed by the Priory 
without some sort of superstitious terror, as if that 
dwelling were an evil place haunted by ghosts. Pretty 
soon a legend grew about the place: a wood cutter 
told how one night, going back from work, he saw 
Madame Mintié all in white, her hair disheveled, cross- 
ing the sky high above and beating her chest with the 
crucifix. 


CALVARY 19 


My father locked himself up in his study more than 
ever, avoiding as much as possible staying in the house 
where he was hardly seen at times other than meal 
hours. He also took to making distant trips, increased 
the number of committees and societies over which he 
presided, found means to create for himself new dis- 
tractions and business affairs far away from home. 
The Council General, the Agricultural Commission, 
the jury of the Court of Assizes were of great help 
to him for that purpose. When some one spoke to 
him of his wife he answered, shaking his head: 

“ Ah, lam very uneasy, very much wrought up over 
it. How will it end? I must confess I fear she may 
become insane..... 

And when some one expressed his unbelief: 

“ No, no, I am not joking. ... You know well that it 
runs in her family, their heads don’t seem to be very 
strong!” 

Nevertheless reproach never came from his lips, 
although he realized the embarrassing condition in 
which this situation placed his business affairs and 
which he ascribed to nothing but the irritating ob- 
duracy of my mother in not wanting to try anything » 
that might cure her. 

It was in these sad surroundings that I grew up. 
I came to this world a tiny, sickly child. What cares, 
what fierce tenderness, what deadly anguishes I 
brought with me! In the presence of the puny crea- 
ture that I was, sustained by a breath of life so feeble 
that it could be guessed at only by*a rattling sound 
in my throat, my mother forgot her own sorrows. 
Maternity revived her worn-out energy, awakened her 
conscience to new duties, to new sacred responsibili- 
ties which now devolved upon her. What ardent 
nights, what feverish days she spent bent over the 
cradle where lay something born of her own flesh and 


20 CALVARY 


soul, and palpitating!... Ah! yes! ... I belonged to 
her, to her only; it was not at all of this conjugal sub- 
mission that I was born; I was not the fatal conse- 
quence of the original sin as other children of men are; 
no! she had always carried me in her womb, and like 
Christ I was conceived in a long cry for love. All her 
troubles, her terrors, her past sufferings she under- 
stood now; it was because a great mystery of creation 
was being enacted in her being. 

She had great difficulty in bringing me up, and if I 
outlived all that had threatened me one might say it 
was accomplished by a miracle of love. More than 
twenty times my mother snatched me from the 
clutches of death. ... And then what a joy and what 
a recompense it was to her to see the little wrinkled 
body fill itself with the sap of health, the rumpled face 
take on the color of shiny pink, the little eyes open 
gaily into a smile, the lips, greedy and searching, 
move and gluttonously pump the life-giving liquid 
from her nourishing breast! My mother now tasted 
a few moments of complete and wholesome happiness. 
A desire to act, to be good and useful, to occupy her 
hands, heart and spirit, to live at last took hold of 
her, and even in the most commonplace duties of her 
household she found a new, a passionate interest which 
was doubled by a feeling of profound peace. Her 
gayety came back to her, a natural and gentle gayety 
without violent outbursts. She made plans, pictured 
the future to herself with confidence, and many a time 
she was astonished to discover that she no longer 
thought of her past — that evil dream which vanished. 

I grew. “One can see him getting bigger every day,” 
the nurse used to say. And with rapturous emotions 
my mother watched the hidden labor of nature which 
polished the rough places of flesh, giving it more pliant 
form, more definite features, better regulated move- 


CALVARY 21 


ments and poured into the dimness of the brain just 
emerged from nothingness the primitive glimmer of 
instinct. Oh, how everything seemed to her now 
clothed in bright and entrancing colors! It was music 
of welcome itself, the benediction of love, and even the 
trees, formerly so full of dread and menace, were 
stretching out their branches above like so many pro- 
tecting arms. One was led to hope that the mother 
had saved the woman. Alas! That hope was of short 
duration. 

One day she noticed in me a certain predisposition 
to nervous fits, to a diseased contraction of muscles, 
and she became alarmed. When I was about one year 
old I had convulsions which came short of finishing 
me. The fits were so violent that my mouth, even 
long after the attack was over, remained twisted into 
an ugly grimace as if paralyzed. My mother would 
not admit that at periods of rapid growth the majority 
of children were subject to-such fits. She saw in that 
something which she thought was characteristic of her 
and her ancestors, she saw in that the first symptoms 
of a hereditary illness, of a terrible disease which she 
thought was going to continue in her son. She battled 
hard, however, against these thoughts which came in 
hives ; she used every bit of energy and vigor she could 
command to dissipate them, taking refuge in me as if 
in an inviolable asylum for protection against phan- 
toms and evil spirits. She held me pressed against 
her bosom, covering me with kisses and saying: 

“ My little Jean, it is not true, is it? You will live 


and be happy, won’t you?... Answer me!... Alas! 
You can’t talk, my poor little angel... . Oh, don’t cry, 
never cry, Jean, my Jean, my dear little Jean! ...” 


But question as she might, feel as she might my 
heart beating against her own, my awkward hands 
gripping her breasts, my legs dangling from under 


22 CALVARY 


the loosed swaddling cloth — her confidence was gone, 
doubts gained the upper hand. An incident which was 
related to me time and again with a sort of religious ter- 
ror served to bring consternation into my mother’s soul. 

One day she was taking a bath. In the hall of the 
bath room laid out with black and white square slabs, 
Marie, bent over me, was watching my first uncertain 
steps. Suddenly, fixing my gaze on a black square, I 
appeared to be very much frightened. I uttered a cry 
and, trembling all over as if I had seen something ter- 
rible, I hid my head in my nurse’s apron. 

“ What’s the matter?” my mother anxiously asked. 

“JT don’t know,” answered old Marie. It seemed 
as though Master Jean had been frightened by a pav- 
ing block. 

She brought me to the spot where my countenance 
so suddenly changed its expression. But at the sight 
of the paving slab, I cried out again. My whole body 
shuddered. 

“There must be something!” cried my mother. 
“Marie, quick, quick, my underwear! ... My God! — 
What did he see?” 

Having come out of the bath room, she did not want 
to wait to be wiped, and scarcely covered by her peig- 
noir she stooped over the stone and examined it. 

“ That’s strange,” she murmured. “ And yet he saw 
something. ... but what?... There isn’t anything....” 

She took me in her arms, swayed me. I smiled now, 
uttering inarticulate sounds and playing with the rib- 
bons of her peignoir. She put me down on the floor. 
Moving with short, unsteady steps, both arms out- 
stretched, I purred like a kitten. None of the 
blocks before which I stopped frightened me in the 
least. Arrived at the fatal block, my face again as- 
sumed the expression of horror, and frightened and 
crying I returned quickly to my mother. 


CALVARY 23 


“T tell you there must be something!” she cried. 
“Call Felix. Let him come with tools ...a hammer, 
quick, quick! Tell Monsieur also!” 

“It seems strange all the same,” assented Marie 
who, with gaping mouth and eyes wide open, was look- 
ing at the mysterious slab. “ He must be a sorcerer 
then!” 

Felix lifted one stone, examined it carefully, dug 
into the mortar below. 

“Dig up another one!” my mother commanded. 
“ And that one also... another one...all of them... 
dig them all up! I want to find out. ... And Monsieur 
is not coming!” 

In the excitement of her gestures, forgetting that 
there was a man around, she uncovered herself and 
revealed her nude body. Kneeling on the blocks, Felix 
continued digging them up. He took each one out 
with his brawny hands and shook his head. 

“If Madame wants me to tell her. . . . For the rest, 
Monsieur is way out in the park, busy sharpening the 
pick-axe. ... And besides, there is nothing to it .. . the 
stone blocks are like stone blocks, seemingly of the 
pavement. That’s all! ... Madame may be sure.... 
Only it might be that that was only in Master Jean’s 
imagination. ... Madame knows that children are like 
grown-up folks and that they see things! But as to 
these slabs, they are just slabs, neither more nor less.” 

My mother became pale, haggard. 

“Shut up!” she ordered, “and get out of here, all 
of you!” 

And without waiting for the execution of her order 
she carried me out of the room. Her cries, interrupted 
by the slamming of the door, resounded on the stair- 
way and in the hall. 

She never thought, however, poor dear creature that 
she was, of giving to the bathroom incident a natural 


: 24 CALVARY 


explanation. One could have demonstrated to her 
that what had frightened me so badly might have been 
a moving reflection of a towel upon the humid surface 
of the floor, or perhaps the shadow. of a leaf projected 
from outside across the window, which of course she 
would not have admitted as likely to have taken place. 
Her spirit, fed on dreams, tormented by lurid exag- 
gerations and instinctively drawn to the mysterious 
and the fantastic, accepted with dangerous credulity 
the vaguest explanation and yielded to the most 
troubling suggestions. She imagined that her ca- 
resses, her kisses, her lulling me to sleep communi- 
cated to me the germs of her disease, that the nervous 
fits which almost caused my death, the hallucinations 
which shone in my eyes with the sombre radiance of 
madness, were to her a divine warning, and as soon 
as she conceived that, the last hope died in her heart. 

Marie found her mistress half naked, stretched out 
on the bed. . 

“My God! My God!” she moaned, “ that’s the end 
of it... .. My poor little Jean! . . . You, too, they will 
take away from me!... Oh, God, have pity on him!... 
Could that be possible! ... So little, so weak! ...” 

And while Marie was putting back her clothes which 
slipped to the ground, trying to quiet her: 

“My good Marie,” she stammered, “listen to me. 
Promise me, yes promise me to do as I tell you.... 
You have seen it just now, you have seen it, haven’t 
you?... Well, take Jean, and bring him, up because I 
— you see... he must not.... I'll kill him. .. . Here, 
you'll stay in this room with him, right near me... . 
You shall take good care of him and tell me all about 
him. ... ll feel his presence there, I’ll hear him. ... 
But you understand, he must not see me... . It is I 
who make him that way! .. .” 

Marie held me in her arms. 


CALVARY 25 


“ Madame, there is no sense in that at all,” she said, 
“and you really deserve a good scolding as a lesson. 
... Why just look at your little Jean! ... He is just 
like a little quail. Now tell her, tell her, my little 
Jean, that you are well and brave! . . . Look, look at 
him laughing, the little creature. . . . Put your arms 
around him, Madame.” 

“No, no!” my mother cried out wildly. “I must 
not.... Later.... Take him away!...” 

It was impossible to make her abandon this idea. 
Marie well understood that if her mistress had any 
chance at all to come back to normal life, to cure her- 
self of her “ black moods,” it was not in being sepa- 
rated from her child. In the sad state in which my 
mother found herself, she had but one means of recov- 
ery and now she rejected it, impelled to do so by some 
new and unknown fit of madness. All that a little 
baby brings of joy, uneasiness, activity, anxiety, for- 
getfulness of self to the heart of a mother was exactly 
what she needed and yet she said: ; 

“No, no....I1 must not.... Later.... Take him 
away!...” 

In her own language, familiar and rude, to which 
her long devotions entitled her, the old servant maid 
brought forward all the reasoning and arguments dic- 
tated by her common sense and by her simple peasant 
heart. She even reproached my mother for neglecting 
her duties, she spoke of her selfishness and declared 
that a good mother who had any religion at all or even 
a savage beast wouldn’t act as she did. 

“Yes,” she ended, “that is bad! ... you have al- 
ready been so unkind to your husband, poor fellow. 
Must you now make your child unhappy?” 

But mother, always sobbing, could but repeat: 

“No, no....I1 must not. ... Later.... Take him 
away!...” 


26 CALVARY 


What was my childhood? A long torpor. Sepa- 
rated from my mother whom I saw but rarely, avoid- 
ing my father whom I did not love at all, living almost 
in seclusion, a miserable orphan between old Marie 
and Felix in this grand lugubrious house, the silence 
and neglect of which weighed down upon me like a 
night of death—I was bored. Yes, I was that rare 
and wretched specimen of a child who is bored. Al- 
ways sad and grave, hardly speaking at all, I had none 
of the inquisitiveness and mischievousness of my age, 
one might have said that my intellect had been slum- 
bering forever in the numbness of maternal gestation. 
I am trying to recall, I am trying to bring to life again 
my feelings of childhood; verily I believe I had none. 
I was dragging on, all wasted and stultified, without 
knowing what to do with my legs, my arms, my eyes, 
my poor little body which annoyed me like a tiresome 
companion whom one wishes to get rid of. There is 
not one recollection, not one single impression that has 
been retained by me even in part. I always wished to 
be where I was not, and the toys exhaling the whole- 
some odor of fir trees were lying in heaps around me, 
without inducing me even to think of touching them. 
Never did I dream about a knife or wooden horse or 
picture book. Today, when I see little children run- 
ning, jumping, chasing one another on the garden 
lawns, the sandy beaches, I recall with sadness the 
first mournful years of my life, and while listening to 
the clear laughter which sounds like the ringing of the 
angelus of human dawn, I say to myself that all my 
misfortunes have come from this childhood, lonely 
and lifeless, unbroken by a single bright event. 

I was not quite twelve years old when my mother 
died. The day on which this misfortune happened the 
good curé Blanchetiére, who liked us very much, 
pressed me to his breast, then he looked at me for 


CALVARY 27 


some time and with eyes full of tears murmured sev- 
eral times: “ Poor little devil!” I burst into uncon- 
trollable tears when I saw the good curé cry, for I 
did not want to reconcile myself to the thought that 
my mother was dead and never again would come 
back. During her illness I was forbidden to go into 
her room, and now she was gone without having let 
me embrace her! . .. Could she have really deserted 
me that way?... When I was about seven years old 
and was well she had agreed to re-admit me into her 
life. It was from this time on that I understood that 
I had a mother and that I adored her. My sorrowing 
mother was represented to me by her two eyes, her 
two large round eyes, fixed, with rings of red around 
them, which always shed tears without moving the eye- 
lids, which shed tears as does a rain cloud or a foun- 
tain. All at once I felt a keen sorrow at the grief of 
my mother, and it is through this grief that I awoke 
to life. I did not know what she suffered from, but I 
knew that her malady must have been horrible; I knew 
that from the way she used to embrace me. She had 
fits of tenderness which used to frighten me and which 
inspire me with fear even now. As she clasped my 
head, squeezed my neck and moved her lips over my 
forehead, my cheeks, my mouth, her frenzied kisses 
often passed into bites, similar to the caresses of a 
beast; into her embraces she put all the true passion 
of a lover, as if I had been the adored chimerical being 
of her dreams, the being that never came, the being 
whom her soul and her body so ardently desired. Was 
it possible then that she was dead? 

Every evening, before going to bed, I fervently 
entreated the beautiful image of the Virgin to whom 
I addressed my prayers: “ Holy Virgin, please grant 
my dear mother good health and a long life.” But one 
morning my father, silent and pale, accompanied the 


28 CALVARY 


physician to the gate, and the countenances of both 
were so grave that it was easy to surmise that some- 
thing irreparable had happened. Then the servants 
were crying. What else could they have cried about, 
if not the loss of their mistress? ... And then did not 
the curé come up to me and say “ poor little devil!” 
in a tone of irremediable pity? I remember the small- 
est details of that frightful day as if it were yesterday. 
From the room where I was shut in with old Marie I 
could hear the coming and going of people and other 
strange noises, and with my forehead pressed against 
the window pane, I could see through the window 
blinds women beggars squatted on the lawn, wax- 
paper in hand, muttering prayers. I saw people enter 
the courtyard, the men in black, the women with long 
black veils. “Ah! here is Monsieur Bacoup!... ” 
“Why, that’s Madame Provost!” I noticed that all 
of them looked sad, while at the gate which was wide 
open the children of the choir, the choristers uncom- 
fortable in their black vestments, the Brothers of 
Charity with their red tunics, one of whom carried a 
banner and another a heavy silver cross, were laughing 
aloud and amusing themselves by pushing and jostling 
one another. The beadle, tinkling his bell, was driv- 
ing back inquisitive mendicants, and a wagon loaded 
with hay which had come up on the road was com- 
pelled to stop and wait. In vain did I look for the 
eyes of little Sorieul, a crippled child of my age whom 
I used to given a small loaf of bread every Saturday; 
I could not find him anywhere, and that made me feel 
uneasy. Then suddenly the bells on the church belfry 
began to toll. Ding! Ding! Dong! The sky was of 
deep blue, the sun was ablaze. Slowly the funeral pro- 
cession started out, first the Brothers of Charity and 
the choristers, the cross which glittered, the banner 
which fluttered in the air, the curé in a white surplice, 


CALVARY 29 


shielding his head with the psalm-book, then some- 
thing heavy and long covered with flowers and wreaths 
which some men carried shaking at their knees, then 
the crowd, a crawling crowd which filled the court- 
yard, wound itself out on the road, a crowd in which 
I could distinguish no one except my cousin Merel 
who was mopping his head with a checkered handker- 
chief. Ding! Dong! Dong! The church bell tolled 
for a long, long time; ah! the sad knell! Ding! Dong! 
Dong! And while the bells were tolling, tolling, three 
white pigeons continuously fluttered about, pursuing 
one another around the church right opposite me which 
projected its warped roof and its slate steeple out 
of plumb above a clump of acacia and chestnut 
trees. 

The ceremony ended, my father entered my room. 
He walked back and forth for some time without 
speaking, his arms crossed on his back. 

“Ah! my poor Monsieur,” lamented old Marie, 
“what a terrible misfortune! ” 

“Yes, yes,” replied my father, “it is a great, a ter- 
rible misfortune! ” 

He sank into an armchair, heaving a sigh. I can see 
him right now with his swollen eyelids, his dejected 
look, his hanging arms. He had a handkerchief in his 
hand, and from time to time brought it to his eyes, 
red from tears. 

“ Perhaps I did not take good care of her, Marie.... 
She did not like to have me around. ... Yet I did what 
I could, everything I could. . . . How frightful she 
looked, all rigid on the bed! . . . Ah, God! I shall al- 
ways see her that way. The day after tomorrow she 
would be thirty-one, would she not?” 

My father drew me toward him and seated me on 
his knees. 

“You love me all the same, don’t you, my little 


30 CALVARY 


Jean?” he asked, rocking me. “Tell me, do you love 
me? I have no one but you!...” 

Speaking to himself he said: 

“ Perhaps it is better that it is so. Who knows what 


the outcome would be later on! ... Yes, perhaps it is 
better this way... . Ah! poor little one, look at me 
straight! . 


And as if at that very moment he had divined in my 
eyes which resembled the eyes of my mother a whole 
destiny of suffering, he pressed me close to his breast 
and burst into tears. 

“ My little Jean! — Ah! my poor little Jean!” 

Worn out by the emotion and fatigue of the night 
before, he fell asleep, holding me in his arms. And I, 
seized suddenly with a feeling of great pity, listened 
to this unknown heart which for the first time was 
beating close to mine. 

It had been decided a few months previous to this 
that I should not be sent to college, but that I should 
have a private tutor. My father did not approve of 
this method of education. But he had met with such 
opposition that he thought best not to interfere, and 
just as he had sacrificed his domination of husband 
over wife, he also gave up his right of a father over 
me. Now I was to have a tutor, for my father wanted 
to remain faithful to the wishes of my mother even 
when she was dead. 

One fine morning I saw him arrive, a very grave- 
looking gentleman, very blond, very close shaven, who 
wore blue spectacles. Monsieur Jules Rigard had very 
obsolete ideas on education, he carried himself with 
the stiffness of a servant, and bore a sacerdotal air 
which, far from encouraging me to learn, made all 
study disgusting to me. He had been told without a 
doubt that my mentality was slow and sluggish and, 
as I understood nothing from his first lesson, he took 


CALVARY 31 


that judgment for granted and treated me like.an idiot. 
It never occurred to him to penetrate into my young 
mind, to hold converse with my heart; never did he 
ask himself whether under this sad mask of a lonesome 
child there were not hidden ardent aspirations quite 
beyond my age, an all too passionate and restless na- 
ture eager to know, which introspectively and mor- 
bidly unfolded itself in the silence of secret thoughts 
and mute ecstasies. 

Monsieur Rigard stupefied me with Greek and 
Latin, and that was all. Ah! how many children un- 
derstood and guided properly, might have become 
great if they ad not been permanently deformed by 
this frightful crushing of their brains by an imbecile 
father or an ignorant teacher. Is it all, then, to have 
lustfully begotten you on an evening of passion, and 
must not one continue the work of one’s life forces by 
giving you intellectual nourishment as well, in order 
that it may strengthen your life and provide you with 
weapons to defend it. The truth was that my soul felt 
even lonelier with my father than with my teacher! 
Yet he did everything he could to please me. He 
consciously, though stupidly, strove to show his love 
for me. But when I was with him, he could never 
find anything to tell me outside of foolish, idle tales, 
bogey man stories, terrifying legends of the revolution 
of 1848 which had left in him an invincible fear, or else 
a tale of the brigandage of one Lebecq, a great repub- 
lican who. scandalized the country by his passionate 
opposition to the curé and his obduracy in refusing to 
hang red bunting on the walls on national holidays. 

Often he would take me along in his cabriolet, on 
his business trips in the country and, when perplexed 
as I was by the mystery of nature which every day 
unfolded itself around me, I asked him questions, he 
would not know how or what to answer and would 


32 CALVARY 


dodge the answer thus: “ You are too young to be 
told that! Wait till you grow up.” And feeling mis- 
erable by the side of the large body of my father which 
swayed with the jolts of the road, I huddled up inside 
the cabriolet, while my father was killing with the 
stick of his whip the gad flies which swarmed on our 
mare’s croup. Every now and then he would say: “I 
have never seen such pestering things; we'll have 
storm, that’s sure.” 

In the church of Saint-Michel, inside a small chapel, 
illumined by the red glimmer of a window, upon an 
altar ornamented with embroidery and vases full of 
flowers, stood a statue of the Virgin. She had a pink 
body, a blue cloak bespangled with silver stars, a lilac- 
colored robe whose folds fell modestly upon gilt san- 
dals. . . . In her arms she held a child, rosy and nude 
with a golden halo around its head, and the eyes of 
the mother rested rapturously upon the child. For 
several months this plaster Virgin was my sole friend, 
and the entire time which I could steal from my les- 
sons I used to spend before this image, contemplating 
its tender colors. She appeared to me so beautiful, so 
kind and sweet that no human creature could rival in 
beauty, kindness and sweetness this painted piece of 
statuary which spoke to me in an unknown and de- 
lightful language and from which there came to me 
something like the intoxicating odor of incense and 
myrrh. When near her I was in truth a different 
child; I felt how rosier my cheeks were getting, how 
my blood was flowing more vigorously in my veins, 
how my thoughts disentangled themselves more easily 
and quickly ; it seemed to me that the black veil which 
hung over my mentality was gradually being lifted, 
revealing new lights to me. 

Marie was made an accomplice in my stealthy 
flights to the church; she often led me to the chapel 


CALVARY 33 


where I remained for hours conversing with the Vir- 
gin, while the old nurse fervently recited her Rosary, » 
kneeling before the altar. She had to get me out of 
my state of ecstasy by force, because otherwise, ab- 
sorbed as I had been in the dreams which transported 
me to heaven, I would never have thought of returning 
home. My passion for this Virgin became so strong 
that away from her I was miserable and wished I had 
never left her at all. “Monsieur Jean will surely be- 
come a priest,” old Marie used to say. It was like a 
yearning for possession, like a violent desire to take 
her, to entwine her, to cover her with kisses. 

I took a notion to make a sketch of her: with what 
love, it would be impossible for you to imagine. When 
the statue had taken on a semblance of crude form on 
the paper, it gave me joy without end. All the energy 
in me that I could put forward I employed in this 
work, which I thought admirable and superhuman. 
More than twenty times I started the drawing over 
again, incensed with the crayon for not conforming 
to the delicacy of the lines, incensed with the paper 
upon which the image would not appear as live and 
real as I should have liked to see it. I was rabid on 
this point. My will was bent upon this unique goal. 
At length I succeeded in giving more or less exact 
substance to my idea of the plaster Virgin — but how 
naive an idea it was. And immediately thereafter I 
stopped thinking of it. An inner voice had told me 
that nature was more beautiful, more moving, more 
splendid, and I began to notice the sun which caressed 
the trees, which played upon the pentiles of the roof, 
covered the grass with gold, illumined the rivers; and 
I began to listen to all the palpitations of life, whose 
puffed up creatures scourge the earth like a body of 
flesh. | 


34 CALVARY 


The years rolled by, wearisome and void. I re- 
mained gloomy, wild, always shut up within myself, 
fond of running about in the fields, penetrating into 
the very heart of the forest. It seemed to me that at 
least there, lulled by the grand voices of things, I was 
less alone and I felt more alive. Without being en- 
dowed with that terrible gift which certain natures 
have of analyzing themselves, questioning themselves, 
searching without end for the reason of their actions, 
I often asked myself who I was and what I wanted. 
Alas! I was nobody and did not want anything. 

My childhood had been spent in darkness, my ado- 
lescence was passed in a void; not having been a child 
I could no more be a young man. I lived in a sort of 
fog. A thousand thoughts were agitating me, but they 
were so confused that I could not seize upon their 
form; none of them detached itself clearly from this 
depth of opaque mist. I had some aspirations; some 
exalted notions, but it would have been impossible for 
me to formulate them, to explain their cause or reason. 
It would have been impossible for me to say into 
which world of reality or dream they transplanted me; 
I had fits of infinite tenderness, in which my whole 
being would lose itself, but for whom or for what this 
feeling was intended, I did not know. Sometimes, all 
of a sudden, I would abandon myself to tears, but the 
reason for these tears? In truth, I knew not. What 
was certain was that nothing was to my liking, that I 
did not see any purpose in living, that I felt myself 
incapable of any effort. 

Children usually say: “I'll be a general, priest, phy- 
sician, innkeeper.” I never said anything of the kind, 
never; never did I tear myself loose from the present; 
never did I venture a glimpse into the future. Man 
appeared to me like a tree which spread out its foliage 
and stretched out its limbs into the stormy skies, with- 


CALVARY 35 


out knowing which flower would bloom at its foot, 
which birds would sing at its top, or which thunder- 
bolt would fell it to the ground. And notwithstanding 
that, the feeling of moral solitude in which I found 
myself oppressed and frightened me. I could not open 
my heart to my father, to my teacher or to anybody 
else. I had no friend, not a living soul who could un- 
derstand, guide or love me. My father and preceptor 
were disheartened by my waywardness, and in the 
country I passed for a feebleminded maniac. In 
spite of everything, however, I was permitted to take 
my college entrance examinations, and though neither 
my father nor myself had any idea as to what I should 
take up, I went to Paris to study law. “ Law will get 
you anywhere,” my father used to say. 

Paris amazed me. It struck me like a place of 
tempestuous uproar and raving madness. Individuals 
and throngs were passing by, strange, incoherent, 
hurrying to work which I imagined terrible and mon- 
strous. Knocked down by horses, jostled by men, 
deafened by the roar of the city always in motion like 
some colossal and hellish factory, blinded by the glare 
of lights to which I was not accustomed, I roamed 
about the city in the strange dream of a demented one. 
I was very much surprised to find trees there. How 
could they grow there, in that soil of pavements, how 
could they shoot upwards in the forest of stone, amidst 
the rumbling noise of men, their branches lashed by 
_ evil winds? 

It took me a long time to get used to this life which 
seemed to me the reverse of nature; and from the 
depths of this boiling hell my thoughts would often 
wander back to the peaceful fields way yonder which 
brought to my nostrils the delicious odor of dug up 
and fertile soil; back to the green retreats of the woods, 
where I heard only the light rustling of the leaves, 


36 CALVARY 


and from time to time in the resonant depths, the dull 
blows of the ax and the almost human groans of the 
old oak trees. Nevertheless, curiosity often drove me 
out of my small room which I occupied on Rue Ou- 
dinot, and I sauntered along the streets, the boule- 
vards, the river banks impelled by a feverish desire 
for walking, my fingers twitching from nervousness, 
my brains squashed, as it were, by the gigantic and 
intense activity of Paris, my senses in some way 
thrown out of balance by all these colors, odors, 
sounds, by the perversion and strangeness of the con- 
tact so new to me. The more I mingled with the 
crowds, the more intoxicated I became with this up- 
roar, the more I saw multitudes of human lives pass 
by, brushing one another, indifferent to one another, 
without apparent attachment, and saw others surge 
forward, disappear and emerge again and so on for- 
ever — the more I felt the overwhelming sense of in- 
exorable loneliness. 

At Saint-Michel, although I was lonely, I at least 
knew some human beings and objects. Everywhere I 
had points of reference by which my spirit was guided; 
the back of a peasant bent over his glebe, the ruins of 
a building at the turn of the road, a ditch, a dog, a 
clay pit, a charming face — everything there was fa- 
miliar to me, if not dear. At Paris everything was 
strange and unknown to me. In this frightful haste 
with which all seemed to be moving about, in the pro- 
found selfishness, in this giddy obliviousness to one 
another into which they were all precipitated, how 
could one retain even for a single moment the atten- 
tion of these people, these phantoms; I don’t speak of 
the attention of tenderness or pity, but of that of 
simple notice! ... One day I saw a man who killed 
another: he was admired and his name was soon on 
everybody’s lips; the next morning I saw a woman 


CALVARY 37 


who lifted her skirt going through obscene motions: 
the crowd followed her. 

Being awkward, ignorant of the ways of the world, 
very timid, I found it hard to make friends. I never 
even set foot in the homes where I was recommended, 
for fear of appearing ridiculous. I had been invited 
for dinner to the home of a cousin of my mother’s who 
was rich and kept a large retinue. The sight of the 
mansion, the footmen in the vestibule, the lights, the 
carpets, the heavy perfume of smothered flowers — all 
this frightened me and I fled, knocking down on the 
stairway a woman in a red cloak who got up and 
started to laugh at my bewildered look. 

The noisy gayety of the young men, my school com- 
rades, whom I had met at the lectures, at the restau- 
rants, in the cafés, was not to my liking either. The 
coarseness of their pleasures hurt me, and the women, 
with their eyes colored with bistre, their overpainted 
lips, their cynicism and shameless speech and behavior 
did not tempt me at all. One evening, however, when 
my nerves were all wrought up, and I was driven by a 
sudden rutting of the flesh, I went into a house of ill- 
fame and left it burning with shame, despising myself, 
remorseful and with the sensation of filth on my skin. 
What! Was it from this slimy and loathsome act that 
men were born! From this time on I looked at women 
more frequently, but my look was no longer chaste, 
and fixed upon them as upon some impure images, it 
was searching for sex and stripping them under the 
folds of their clothes. I came to know their secret 
vices, which rendered me still more dejected, restless 
and out of sorts. 

A kind of crapulous torpor settled down upon me. 
I used to stay in bed several days at a stretch, sunk in 
the brutishness of obscene dreams, awakened now and 
then by sudden nightmares, by painful attacks of heart- 


38 CALVARY 


ache which caused my skin to perspire. In my room, 
behind drawn curtains, I was thus living like a corpse 
which was conscious of its death and which from the 
depth of its grave in the frightful night could hear the 
stamping of many feet and the rumble of the city about 
it. Sometimes, tearing myself loose from this dejec- 
tion, I went out. But what was I going todo? Where 
could I go? I was indifferent to everything, and I 
had not a single desire or curiosity. With fixed gaze, 
with heavy drooping head and listless, I used to walk 
straight ahead, without purpose, and I would end by 
flinging myself on a bench in the Luxembourg, senilely 
shrunk into myself, lying motionless for many hours, 
without seeing anything, without hearing anything, 
without asking myself why there were children about 
me, why there were birds singing, why young couples 
passed. ... Naturally I was not working and did not 
think of anything. ... 

Then war came, then defeat... . Despite the oppo- 
sition of my father, despite the entreaties of old Marie, 
I enlisted. 


CHAPTER II 


UR regiment was what is called a march regi- 
ment, that is, one formed while on the march. 


It had been made up at Mans, after much 
trouble, of all the remains of a corps of dissimilar 
fighting units which encumbered the city. Zuaves, 
mobilized soldiers, of franc-tireurs, forestry guards, 
dismounted cavalrymen, including gendarmes, Span- 
iards and Wallachians— there were troops of every 
kind and description, and they were all under the 
command of an old captain quickly promoted for the 
occasion to the rank of lieutenant colonel. At that 
time, such promotions were not infrequent. The gaps 
of human flesh wrought in the ranks of the French by 
the cannons of Wissembourg and Sedan had to be 
filled. Several companies lacked officers. 

At the head of mine was a little lieutenant of the 
reserves, a young man of twenty, frail and pallid and 
so weak that after marching a few kilometers he was 
out of breath, dragged his feet and usually reached his 
destination in an ambulance wagon. The poor little 
devil! It was enough to look at him to make him 
blush, and never did he allow himself to issue orders 
for fear of appearing ridiculous. We jeered at him 
because of his timidity and weakness, and no doubt 
because he was kind and would sometimes distribute 
cigars and meat supplies to the men. I quickly inured 
myself to this new life, carried away by examples and 
overexcited by the fever about me. And reading the 
heartbreaking reports of our lost battles, I felt myself 
transported by enthusiasm which, however, was not 
mingled with any thought of my threatened father- 


40 CALVARY 


land. We remained a month in Mans for training, to 
get our full equipment and to frequent cabarets and 
houses of ill-fame. At last, October 3, we started out. 

Composed of stray units, of detachments without 
officers, of straggling volunteers poorly equipped, 
poorly fed and more often not fed at all,— without co- 
hesion, without discipline, everyone thinking of him- 
self only, and driven by a unique feeling of ferocious- 
ness, implacable selfishness ; some wearing police caps, 
others having silk handkerchiefs wrapped round their 
heads; still others wearing artillery pants and vests of 
batmen—we were marching along the highways, 
ragged, harassed and in an ugly mood. 

For twelve days since we had been incorporated into 
a brigade of recent formation, we were tramping across 
the fields like madmen and to no purpose, as it were. 
Today marching to the right, tomorrow to the left, 
one day covering a stretch of forty kilometers, the 
next day going back an equal distance, we were mov- 
ing in the same circle, like a scattered herd of cattle 
which has lost its shepherd. Our enthusiasm dimin- 
ished appreciably. Three weeks of suffering were 
enough for that. Before we could ever hear the roar 
of cannon and the whiz of bullets, our forward march 
resembled a retreat of a conquered army, cut to pieces 
by cavalry charges and precipitated into wild con- 
fusion. It was like a panicky flight in which each one 
was allowed to shift for himself. How often did I see 
soldiers getting rid of their cartridges by scattering 
them along the roads? 

“What good will they do me?” one of them said. 
“TI don’t need them at all except one to crack the jaw 
of our captain, the first chance we get to fight.” 

In the evening, in camp, squatted around the por- 
ridge pot or stretched out on the cold furze, with heads 
resting on their knapsacks, they were thinking of the 


CALVARY 41 


homes from which they had been taken by force. All 
the young men, strong and healthy, had come from 
the villages. Many of them were already sleeping in 
the ground way yonder, disembowelled by shells; 
others with shattered backs, like shadows, were strag- 
gling in the fields and in the woods awaiting death. 
In the small country places, left to sorrow, there were 
only old men, more stooped than ever, and women who 
wept. The barn-floors where they thrashed corn were 
mute and closed, in the deserted fields where weeds 
sprouted, one no longer saw against the purple back- 
ground of the sunset the silhouette of the laborer re- 
turning home, keeping step with his tired horses. And 
men with long sabres would come and in the name of 
the law take away the horses one day and empty the 
cowshed the next; for it was not enough that war 
should glut itself with human flesh, it was necessary 
that it should also devour beasts, the earth itself, 
everything that lived in the calm and peace of labor 
and love.... And at the bottom of the hearts of all 
these miserable soldiers whose emaciated frames and 
flagged limbs were lit up by the sinister glare of camp 
fires— there was one hope, the hope of the coming 
battle, that is to say, the hope of flight, of butt turned 
upwards, and of the German fortress. 

Nevertheless we were preparing for the defence of 
the country which we traversed and which was no 
longer threatened. To accomplish that we thought it 
would be best to fell trees and scatter them on the 
roads; we blew up bridges and desecrated cemeteries 
at the entrance to villages under the pretext of barri- 
cading them, and we compelled the inhabitants at the 
point of the bayonet to help us in the destruction of 
their property. Then we would depart, leaving behind 
us nothing but ruin and hatred. I remember one time 
we had to raze a very beautiful park to the last stad- 


42 CALVARY 


dling, in order to build barracks which we never used 
at all. Our manner of doing things was not at all 
such as to reassure the people. And so at our approach 
the houses were shut, the peasants hid their provisions ; 
everywhere we were met by hostile faces, surly mouths 
and empty hands. There were bloody scuffles over 
some potted pork discovered in a cupboard, and the 
general ordered an old and kindly man shot for hiding 
a few kilograms of salted pork under a heap of manure. 

The first of November we marched all day and 
about three o’clock we arrived at the railroad station 
of Loupe. There was great disorder and unspeakable 
confusion at first. Many, leaving the ranks, scattered 
in the direction of the city, ten kilometers away, and 
disappeared in the neighboring cabarets. For more 
than an hour the bugles sounded a rally. Mounted 
men were sent to the city to bring back the runaways, 
but they themselves lingered there to get a drink. 
There was a rumor afloat that a train made up at 
Nogent-le-Rotrou was supposed to take us to Chartres 
menaced by the Prussians who were said to have 
sacked Maintenon and were camping at Jouy. A 
workman questioned by our sergeant said that he did 
not know anything about it, nor did he hear anything 
ever said about it. The general, rather old, short, 
stout and gesticulating, who could hardly sit up in his 
saddle, galloped hither and thither, shaking and sway- 
ing like a drunkard on his saddle horse and with pur- 
ple face, bristled moustach, repeated without end: 

“Ah! scoundrel!... Ah! scoundrel of scoundrels! ...” 

He dismounted, assisted by his orderly; his legs 
got tangled up in the leather strap of his sabre which 
dragged on the ground, and having called over the 
station master, entered into a most animated conver- 
sation with the latter whose countenance showed per- 
plexity. 


CALVARY 43 


“How about the mayor?” shouted the general. 
“Where is that scoundrel? Get me that fellow!... 
Are they trying to make a fool out of me here or 
what!” 

He was out of breath, sputtered out unintelligible 
words, stamped his feet and scolded the station mas- _ 
ter. Finally both of them, one with a mien of humility, © 
the other gesticulating furiously, disappeared into the 
telegraph office from which there came to us the click- 
ing of the apparatus, frenzied, excited, interrupted 
from time to time by the outbursts of the general. At 
last it was decided to draw us up on the quay in com- | 
pany formation, and we were left there standing, knap- 
sack on the ground, in front of the formed arm racks. 
... Night came, rain fell, drizzling and cold, penetrat- 
ing through our uniforms already drenched by show- 
ers. Here and there the road was lit up by small dim 
lights, rendering more sombre than ever the store- 
houses and the mass of wagons which men were push- 
ing into a shed. And the derrick crane standing up- 
right on the turning platform projected its long neck 
against the sky like a bewildered giraffe. 

Apart from coffee which we gulped down hurriedly 
in the morning, we did not eat anything all day, and 
although fatigue had worn out our bodies and hunger 
clutched our stomachs, we anticipated with horror 
that we would have to go without supper today. Our 
gourd-bottles were empty, our supplies of biscuits and 
bacon exhausted, and the wagons of the commissary 
department which had gone astray had not yet joined 
our columns. Several among us grumbled, made 
threats and voiced their rebellious feelings aloud, but’ 
the no less dejected officers who were promenading in 
front of the arm racks, did not seem to take notice of 
it. I consoled myself with the thought that the general 
had perhaps requisitioned food in the city. It was a 


44 CALVARY 


vain hope. The time passed, the rain kept steadily 
drumming on the hollow mess plates and the general 
continued swearing at the station master who in turn 
went on avenging himself verbally on the telegraph, 
the click of which became more and more violent and 
erratic. From time to time trains came up over- 
crowded with troops. Soldiers of the reserve, light 
infantry units, bare-breasted, bare-headed, with loose 
cravats, some of them drunk and wearing their kepis 
wrong side up, deserted the wagons where they were 
parked, invaded the taverns and even relieved them- 
selves in public impudently. From this swarm of hu- 
man heads, from this stamping on the floor of the cars 
by multitudes there emanated oaths, sounds of the 
Marseillaise, obscene songs which mingled with shouts 
of the gangs of workmen, with the tinkling of bells, 
with the panting of machines.... I recognized a little 
boy from Saint-Michel whose swollen eyelids oozed, 
who coughed and spat blood. I asked him where they 
were going. He did not know. Having left Mans, 
they were held up at Connerre for twelve hours with- 
out food because of congestion on the road,—too 
crowded to lie down and sleep. He hardly had 
strength enough to speak. He went into a tavern to 
rinse his eyes with warm water. I shook hands with 
him, and he said he sincerely hoped that in the first 
battle the Germans would make a prisoner of him... . 
And the train pulled out, disappeared in the night, 
carrying all these wan faces, all these bodies already 
vanquished toward what useless and _ bloody 
slaughters? 

I shivered with cold. Under the icy rain which 
drenched me to the very marrow, I felt a _ ter- 
rible cold penetrating me. It seemed as if my mem- 
bers were getting numb. I took advantage of the con- 
fusion caused by the arrival of a train to reach the 





CALVARY - 45 


open gate and run out on the road in search of a house 
or cover where I could warm myself, find a piece of 
bread or something. The inns and public places near 
the station were guarded by sentries who had orders 
not to let anyone in. ... Three hundred yards away I 
noticed a few windows which shone gently in the 
night. These lights looked to me like two kindly 
eyes, two eyes filled with pity which called me, smiled 
to me, caressed me.... It was a small house isolated 
a few strides away from the road. I ran toward it. . 

A sergeant accompanied by four men was there, 
shouting and swearing. Near the fireplace without a 
fire, I saw an old man seated on a very low wicker 
chair, his elbows resting on his knees, his face buried 
in his hands. A candle burning in an iron candlestick 
lit up half of his face hollowed and furrowed by deep 
wrinkles. 

“ Will you give us some wood, I am asking you for 
the last time?” shouted the sergeant. 

“T ain’t got no wood,” answered the old man... . 
“It’s been eight days since the troops passed here, I 
tell you.... They took everything away.’ 

He huddled himself up on the chair and in a feeble 
voice muttered: 

“Tain’t got...nothing... Nothing!...” 

“ Don’t act the rogue, you old rascal... . Ah, you 
are hiding your wood to warm the Prussians. ... Well 
I am going to knock those Prussians out of your head.” 

The old man shook his head: 

“ But if I ain’t got no wood....” 

With angry gestures the sergeant commanded the 
soldiers to search the house. They examined every- 
thing, looked everywhere from cellar to garret. They 
found nothing, nothing but evidence of plunder and 
some broken furniture. In the cellar, damp with 
spilled cider, the casks were broken open and over the 


46 - CALVARY 


whole there spread a hideously offensive stench. That 
exasperated the sergeant who struck the flat end of 
the butt of his musket. 

“Come on,” he shouted, “ come on, you old sloven, 
tell us where your wood is,” and he rudely shook the 
old man who tottered and almost struck his head 
against the andiron of the fireplace. 

“T ain’t got no wood,” the poor man simply repeated. 

“ Ah! you are getting stubborn! ... Yiou have no 
wood you say! Well, look here, you have chairs, a 
buffet, a table, a bed . . . if you don’t tell me where 
your wood is I’ll burn it all up.” 

The old man did not protest. Shaking his aged 
white head he again repeated: 

“T ain’t got no wood.” 

I wanted to intercede and muttered a few words; 
but the sergeant did not let me finish. He took me in 
from head to foot with a look of contempt. 

“What are you doing around here, you errand simp 
you? Who gave you permission to leave the ranks, 
you dirty, snotty-nosed trash? Come on, face about 
double step, march!...Tarata tara, tatara!...” 

Then he gave the command. In a few minutes the 
chairs, the tables, the buffet, the bed were dashed to 
pieces. The kindly man raised himself with some ef- 
fort, went into the farthest corner of the room; and 
while the fire was being made, while the sergeant, 
whose cloak and trousers were steaming, was warm- 
ing himself laughingly in front of the crackling fire, 
the old man was watching the burning of his last piece 
of furniture with eyes of a stoic, and never stopped 
repeating obstinately : 

“T ain’t got no wood.” 

I went back to the station. The general had come 
out of the telegraph office more excited and flushed 
and angry than ever. He jabbered out something and 


CALVARY. 47 


presently brought about a great commotion. The 
clang of sabres was heard, voices called out and an- 
swered one another, officers were running in all direc- 
tions. The bugle sounded. Without the least under- 
standing of this counter order, we had to put our 
knapsacks on our backs and the guns on our shoulders. 

Forward! March!... 

With bodies rendered rigid by immobility and with 
dizzy heads, we pushed and jostled one another and 
resumed our breathless journey in the rain, in the mud, 
through the night!... To the right and the left of us 
there were long stretches of fields swallowed up in the 
shadows from which rose the crowns of apple trees 
which appeared to be twisted in the skies. From time 
to time the barking of a dog was heard from afar.... 
There were deep forests, sombre thickets which rose 
like walls on each side of the road. Then came villages 
asleep, where our steps resounded even more mourn- 
fully, or where at a window quickly opened and quickly 
closed again, there appeared the vague outline of a 
human white form... terrified.... Then again fields 
and woods and villages.... Nota single song, not a 
single word, only an immense silence, accentuated by 
the rhythm of the tramping feet. The leather straps 
of the knapsack cut into my flesh, the rifle felt like a 
red hot iron bar placed upon my shoulder. For a mo- 
ment I thought myself harnessed to a huge wagon, 
loaded with broad stone and stuck in the mud and felt 
that the carters were breaking my legs with the lashes 
of whips. With my feet planted in the ground, my 
spine bent in two, with outstretched neck, strangled 
by the bit, my lungs emitting a rattling sound, I was 
pulling and pulling. ... Pretty soon I reached a state 
where I was no longer conscious of anything. I was 
marching in a state of torpor, like an automaton, as if 
in a trance.... Strange hallucinations flitted before 


48 CALVARY 


my eyes. I saw a glowing road receding into space, 
lined with palatial mansions and brilliant lights... . 
Strange scarlet flowers swayed their corollz in the air 
on the top of flexible stems, and a crowd of gay people 
were singing at tables laden with refreshments and 
delicious fruit... . Women with fluttering gauze skirts 
were dancing on illumined lawns, to the music of nu- 
merous orchestras hidden in the grove strewn with 
falling leaves, adorned with jasmines, sprinkled with 
water. 

“ Halt!” commanded the sergeant. 

I stopped, and in order not to sink down to the 
ground I had to hold on to the arm of a comrade. I 
awoke from my trance. . . . Darkness was all around 
me. We had come to the entrance of a forest, near a 
small town where the general and most of the officers 
went to find quarters. Having pitched my tent, I oc- 
cupied myself with rubbing my feet, the skin of which 
was peeling off, with a candle which I had hidden in 
my knapsack, and like an emaciated dog, stretched 
myself out on the wet ground and immediately fell 
asleep. During the night, fellow-soldiers who, ex- 
hausted with fatigue, |had dropped out of the ranks on 
the road, kept on coming into camp. Of these, five 
men were never heard from. It was ever so at each 
difficult march. Some of the men, weak or sick, fell 
into the ditches and died there; others deserted. ... 

The next morning reveille was sounded at dawn. 
The night had been extremely cold, it never stopped 
raining and we could not get any straw litter or hay 
to sleep on. It was very difficult for me to get out of 
the tent; for a while I was obliged to crawl on my 
knees on all fours, my legs refusing to carry me. My 
limbs were frozen stiff like bars of iron, I could not 
move my head on my paralyzed neck, and my eyes 
which felt as if they had been pricked by numerous 


CALVARY 49 


tiny needles, kept shedding tears in ceaseless streams. 
... At the same time I felt an acute, lancinating, un- 
bearable pain in my back and shoulders. I noticed 
that my comrades fared no better. With drawn faces 
of ghostly pallor they were advancing, some limping 
piteously, others bent down and staggering over 
clumps of underbrush —all lame, mournful and cov- 
ered with mud. I saw several men who, seized with 
the colic, writhed and twisted their mouths, holding 
their hands to their bellies. Some of them were shiv- 
ering with fever, and their teeth chattered with cold. 
All around us one could hear dry coughs rending hu- 
man breasts, groans, short and raucous breathing. A 
hare ventured out of its cover and fled wildly, with its 
ears flapping, but no one thought of pursuing the ani- 
mal as we used sometimes to do. After the roll call, 
foodstuffs were distributed, as the commissary re- 
gained our regiment. We made some soup which we 
ate as greedily as half-starved dogs. 

I was still suffering. After the soup I had an at- 
tack of dizziness followed by vomiting, and I shook 
with fever. Everything around me was in a whirl — 
the tents, the forest, the fields, the small town way 
yonder, whose chimneys were smoking in the mist, 
and the sky where huge clouds were floating, bleak 
and low. I asked the sergeant for permission to see a 
doctor. 

Our tents were arranged in two rows, backed against 
the forest on each side of the road of Senonches which 
led into the open country through a magnificent grove 
of oak trees, crossed the Chartre road three hundred 
meters away and still further the town of Belhomert 
and extended farther toward Loupe. At the crossing 
of these two roads there was a small dilapidated build- 
ing covered with thatch, a sort of abandoned shed 
which provided shelter for the laborers on the road 


50 CALVARY 


during rain. It was here that the surgeon had estab- 
lished a sort of improvised field hospital recognizable 
by a Red Cross flag put up in a crack in the wall and 
adorning it. 

In front of the house a crowd was waiting. A long 
line of human beings, wan and worn out, some stand- 
ing with fixed looks, others sitting on the ground, 
sad with stooped and pointed shoulders, their heads 
buried in their hands. Death had already laid its 
terrible hand upon these emaciated countenances, these 
scraggy frames, these members which hung loose, 
devoid of blood and marrow. And confronted with 
this heartbreaking sight, I forgot my own suffering, 
and my heart was touched with pity. Three months 
were sufficient to break down these robust bodies, 
inured to labor and fatigue! ... Three months! And 
these young men who loved life, these children of the 
soil who grew up as dreamers in the freedom of the 
fields, trusting in the goodness of nature, these youths 
were done for! ... To the marine who dies is given 
the sea as a burying place; he descends into eternal 
darkness to the rhythm of its murmuring waves. But 
these! ...A few more days of grace perhaps, and 
then these tatterdemallions will suddenly tumble 
down into the mud of a ditch, their corpses delivered 
up to the fangs of prowling dogs and to the beaks of 
‘nightbirds. 

I was swept by a feeling of such brotherly and sorrow- 
ful pity for them that I wished I could press all these 
unhappy men to my breast, in a single embrace, and 
I wished, oh, how ardently I wished it!—I had a 
hundred female breasts, like Isis, swollen with milk, 
that I might offer to all these bloodless lips. . . They 
were entering the house one by one and were leaving 
it as quickly, pursued by growling and swearing sounds. 
For the rest, the surgeon did not bother with them at 


CALVARY 51 


all. Very angry, he was demanding of his orderly his 
medicine chest which was missing from the luggage. 

“ My medicine chest, for God’s sake!” he shouted. 
“Where is my medicine chest? And my instrument 
case? .. What did you do with my instrument case? 
Ah! for God’s sake! .. .” 

A little soldier of the reserves who suffered from 
an abscess on his knee came back hopping on one foot, 
crying, pulling his hair in despair. They did not want 
to attend to him. When it was my turn to go in I 
was all atremble. Inside the place which was dark, 
four patients, lying flat in the straw, were emitting 
rattling sounds like the cock of a musket; a fifth one 
was gesticulating, muttering incoherent words in de- 
lirium; still another, half-reclining, with head drooped 
on his chest, was moaning and asking for a drink in a 
feeble voice, the voice of an infant. Squatted in front 
of the fire place, an attendant was holding over the 
flame, on the end of a stick, a piece of stale pudding 
whose stench of burned grease filled the room. The 
adjutant did not even look at me. He shouted: 

“Well, what’s the matter now? ...A bunch of 
lazy buggers. A good ten league run at a stretch will 
fix you up, you straggler.... Face about!.... March!” 

On the threshold I met a peasant woman who 
asked me: 

“Ts this the place where you can see the doctor.” 

“Women now!” growled the adjutant. ‘“ What do 
you want now?” 

“Beg pardon, excuse me, Doctor,” rejoined the 
peasant woman, who came up very timidly. “I came 
for my son who is a soldier.” 

“Tell me now, old woman, am I here to keep track 
of your son, or what?” 

With her hands crossed on the handle of her um- 
brella, timorous, she examined the place about her. 


52 CALVARY 


“It seems like he is very sick, my son is, very, very 
sick. .. And so I came to see if he was not around 
here, Doctor.” 

“What’s your name?” 

“My name is Riboulleau.” 

“Riboulleau.... Riboulleau! ... That may be.... 
look in that pile there.” 

The attendant who was broiling his pudding turned 
his head. 

“ Riboulleau,” he said, “why he has been dead — 
three days already. . .” 

“What is that you are saying?” cried the peasant 
woman whose sunburned face suddenly became pallid. 
“Where did he die? ... Why did he die, my little 
darling boy.” 

The adjutant intervened, and rudely pushing the 
old woman toward the door, shouted: 

“Go on, go on, no scenes around here! Well, he is 
dead — and that is all there is to it.” 

“My little darling boy! My little darling boy!” 
wailed the old woman in a heart-breaking manner. 

I walked away with a heavy heart and felt so dis- 
couraged that I was asking myself whether it was not 
better to put an end to it all at once by hanging myself 
on the branch of a tree or by blowing my brains out 
with the gun. While I was going to my tent, stum- 
bling on the way, I was hardly paying any attention to 
the little soldier who, having stopped at the foot of a 
pine tree, had opened his abscess with his knife him- 
self, and, pale, with sweat drops rolling all over his 
forehead, was bandaging his bleeding wound. 

In the morning I felt a great deal better than I 
thought I would. I was relieved of all work, and after 
having greased my rifle which became rusted in the 
rain, I enjoyed a few hours of rest. Stretched out on 
my blanket, with my body torpid in delicious half 


CALVARY 53 


slumber where I distinctly heard all the noises of the 
camp —the sounding of the bugle, the neighing of 
the horses as if coming from afar —I was thinking of 
the people and the things I had left behind me. A 
thousand images and a thousand scenes of the past 
rapidly filed before my eyes. I saw again the Priory, 
my dead mother and my father, with his large straw 
hat and the short beggar with his flaxen hair and 
Felix squatted in the lettuce patches, lying in wait 
for a mole. I saw again my study room, my school 
mates and, topping the noise of the Bal Bullier, Nini, . 
her hair loose and brown, with her ruddy neck and her 
pink stockings showing like some lascivious flower 
from under the skirt raised in dancing. Then the 
image of an unknown woman in a yellow dress, whom 
I noticed in the shadow of a box in a theatre one 
evening, came back to me — an insistent and sweet 
vision. 

During this time the strongest among us had gone 
out to roam in the fields and on the farms. They came 
back merrily carrying bundles of straw, chickens, tur- 
keys and ducks. One of them was driving before him 
with a switch, a big, grunting pig; another was 
balancing a sheep on his shoulder. At the end of a 
halter the latter was also dragging a calf which, 
tangled up in the rope, resisted comically and shook 
its snout, bellowing all the time. The peasants came 
up running to the camp to complain that they had 
been robbed; they were hooted and driven out. 

The general, very stiff and with round eyes, came 
to review us in the afternoon, accompanied by our 
lieutenant who walked at his right. His shiny look, 
his flushed cheeks, his mealy voice bore witness to 
the fact that he had had a plentiful breakfast. He was 
munching the end of an extinguished cigar; he spat, 
sniffed, swore. One could not tell at whom or what, 


54 CALVARY 


for he did not address himself to any one in particular. 
When standing in front of our company, he looked at 
our lieutenant-colonel severely, and I heard him say: 

“Your men are dirty slops!” 

Then he walked away, his body weighed down by 
his belly, dragging his feet, dressed in yellow boots 
above which red breeches swelled and folded like a 
skirt. 

The rest of the day was\devoted to loitering in the 
taverns of Belhomert. There was such crowding and 
such noise everywhere, and besides I knew so well 
these fights in the cabarets, these violent outbursts as 
a result of drunkenness which often degenerated into 
general scuffles, that I preferred to go out on the road, 
far from all these brawls, in the company of a few 
peaceable comrades. 

Just then the weather grew better, dim sunlight 
came from the sky freed from clouds. We seated our- 
selves on the side of a sloping hill, bending our backs 
under the warm sun rays as does a cat under the hand 
that caresses it. Vehicles kept passing by, heavy 
carts, dung carts, small carriages with awning hoods, 
rubbish carts drawn by small mules. Those were the 
peasants of Chartres valley who were fleeing from the 
Prussians. . . . Excited by rumors, spread from village 
to village, of burnings, robberies, murders and all 
kinds of atrocities committed by the Germans in the 
invaded territories, they were carrying away in haste 
their most precious possessions, abandoning their 
homes and their fields and, utterly bewildered, were 
proceeding straight ahead, without knowing where 
they were going. In the evening they would stop at 
some chance road, near a town, sometimes in the open 
fields. The horses, unharnessed and fettered, browsed 
on the river banks, the people ate and slept at Ged’s 
mercy, guarded by dogs, in storm and rain, in the cold 


CALVARY 55 


of foggy nights. Then in the morning they would 
start out again. Droves of animals, and throngs of 
men succeeded one another alternately. They were 
passing by us, and upon the yellow main road one 
could see the black and mournful procession of the 
refugees as far as the hill closing the horizon: one 
might think it was an exodus of a whole people. I 
questioned an old man who led a donkey pulling a 
cart, at the bottom of which in the midst of bundles, 
tied with kerchiefs, and carrots and heads of cabbage, 
on a pile of straw there shifted about a peasant woman 
with a flat nose, two pink-colored pigs and a few do- 
mestic fouls tied by their feet in twos. 

“Eh, the robbers!” the old man replied. “ Don’t 
speak to me about them!... They came one morning, 
a whole gang of them with plumed hats. ... They 
raised such a racket! ... Eh, Holy Jesus! And then 
they took everything away. ... Well I thought they 
were the Prussians. ... I have found out since that 
they were the ‘franc-tireurs’. . .” 

“ How about the Prussians?” 

“The Prussians! . . . Of them that are Prussians I 
have seen very few to be sure. ... They are supposed 
to be up at our place right now! ... Jacqueline thinks 
she saw one behind the hedge the other day!... He 
was tall, very tall and he was as red as the devil.... 
Is he really one of these fellows, those savages that 
came?... Now tell me truly who are they?” 

“Those are Germans, old man, just as we are 
French.” . 

“Germans? ... So I hear. ... But what do they 
want, those damned Germans, will you please tell me, 
mister soldier? ... Well, I have saved two pigs, our 
girl and all our poultry just the same!... By Jove!” 

And the peasant continued on his way, repeating: 


56 CALVARY 


“The Germans! the Germans! ... What do these 
damned Germans want?” 

That evening fires were made along the entire line 
of the camp, and the attractive looking pots full of 
fresh meat were hissing joyously upon the improvised 
stoves of earth and stone. For us that was a time of 
exquisite respite and delicious forgetfulness. Peace 
seemed to have descended from heaven, all blue with 
the moon and aglitter with stars; the fields, unrolling 
themselves with soft and misty undulations, had in 
them a kind of tender sweetness which penetrated into 
our souls and set new blood, less acrid and endowed 
with new vigor, circulating in our members. Little by 
little, memories of our hardships, our discourage- 
ments and privations, however near, effaced them- 
selves, and simultaneously with the awakening of our 
sense of duty, a desire for action seized us. Unusual 
animation reigned at our camp. Every one offered 
voluntarily to do some kind of work; some, torch in 
hand, were running about to light again the fires which 
went out, others were blowing at the ashes in order 
to kindle them into flame again, still others were sort- 
ing vegetables and slicing meat. Some comrades, 
forming a circle around the débris of burned timber, 
struck up a tune “Have you seen Bismark?” in a 
jeering chorus. Revolt—the child of hunger — had 
its inception in the hissing of saucepans, in the clatter 
of platters. 

The next day, when the last of us answered “ Pres- 
ent” at the roll call, the little lieutenant gave the 
command: “ Form a circle, march!” 

And in a faltering voice, jumbling the words and 
skipping phrases, the quartermaster read a pompous 
order of the day, issued by the general. In that piece 
of military literature it was said that a Prussian army 
corps, starving, ill-clad and without arms, after having 


CALVARY 57 


occupied Chartres, was advancing on us at double 
marching time. Our task was to block its way, to 
throw it back as far as the walls of Paris, where the 
valiant Ducrot was only waiting for our arrival to 
sally out and clean the land of all invaders at one 
sweep. The general recalled the victories of the 
Revolution, the Egypt expedition, Austerlitz, Boro- 
dino. He expressed the faith that we would show 
ourselves worthy of our glorious ancestors of Sambre- 
et-Meuse. In view of that he gave precise strategic 
instructions for the defense of the country, namely: to 
establish an impregnable barrier to the eastern en- 
trance to the town and another still more impregnable 
barrier upon the road of Chartres, to fortify the walls 
of the cemetery at the cross-road, to fell as many trees 
as possible in the nearby forest so that the enemy 
cavalry and even infantry should be unable to turn our 
flank from Senonches under the cover of the woods, 
to be on the lookout for spies, and finally to keep our 
eyes open. ... The country was counting on us.... 
Long live the Republic! 

The cheer was not responded to. The little lieu- 
tenant who was walking around, his arms crossed on 
his back, his eyes obstinately fixed on the point of his 
boot, did not raise his head. We looked at one another 
' perplexed, with a sort of anguish in our hearts, which 
came as a result of our knowledge that the Prussians 
were very near, that war was going to begin for us in 
earnest the very next day, today perhaps. And I had 
a sudden vision of Death, red Death standing on a 
chariot, drawn by rearing horses, which was sweeping 
down on us, brandishing his scythe. As long as the 
actual fighting was only a remote possibility we 
wanted to be in it, first for reasons of patriotism, 
enthusiasm, then out of mere braggadocio, later be- 
cause we were nervously exhausted and wearisome 


58 CALVARY 


and saw in it a way out of our misery. Now when 
the opportunity offered itself, we were afraid; we 
shuddered at the mere mention of it. Instinctively my 
eyes turned toward the horizon, in the direction of 
Chartres. And the fields seemed to me to conceal a 
secret, unknown terror, a fearful uncertainty, which 
lent to things a new aspect of relentlessness. Over 
yonder, above the blue line of trees, I expected to see 
helmets spring up suddenly, bayonets flash, the thun- 
dering mouths of cannons spurt fire. A harvest field, 
all red under the sun, appeared to me like a pond of 
blood. Hedges strung themselves out into armies, 
joined ranks, crossed one another like regiments, brist- 
ling with arms and standards and going through var- 
ious evolutions before the battle. The apple trees 
looked frightened like cavalry men thrown into dis- 
order. 

“ Break the circle — march! ” shouted the lieutenant. 

Stupefied, with swinging arms, we were standing 
on one place for a long time, a prey to some vague 
misgiving, trying to pierce in thought this terrible line 
on the horizon, behind which was now being realized 
the mystery of our fate. In this disquieting silence, 
in this sinister immobility, only carts and herds were 
passing by, more numerous, more hurried and pressed 
than ever. A flock of ravens, which came from yonder 
like a black vanguard, spotted the skies, thickened, 
distended and, stringing itself out into a line, turned 
aside, floating above us like a funeral cloak, then dis- 
appeared among the oak trees. 

“ At last we are going to see them, these famous 
Prussians!” said, in a faltering voice, a big fellow 
who was very pale and who, in order to give himself 
the air of a fearless daredevil, was beating his ears 
with his kepi. 

No one replied to this remark and several walked 


CALVARY 59 


away. Our corporal, however, shrugged his shoulders. 
He was a very impudent little man, with a pock-eaten 
face, full of pimples. 

“Oh! I!” he said. 

He clarified his thought by a cynical gesture, sat 
down on the heath, puffed at his pipe slowly, till fire 
appeared. 

“Oh, piffle!” he concluded, emitting a cloud of 
smoke which vanished in the air. 

While one company of chasseurs was detailed to 
the crossroads to establish an “impregnable barrier” 
there, my company went in the woods to “fell as 
many trees as possible.” All the axes, bill-hooks 
and hatchets of the village were speedily requisitioned. 
Almost everything was used as a tool. For a whole day 
the blows of the axes were resounding and trees were 
falling. To spur us on to greater efforts, the general 
himself wanted to assist us in the vandalism. 

“Come on, you scamps!” he would cry out at every 
occasion, clapping his hands. “Come on boys, let’s 
get this one! .. .” 

He himself pointed out the most stalwart among 
the trees, those which grew up straight and spread 
out like the columns of a temple. It was an orgy of 
destruction, criminal and foolish; a shout of brutal joy 
went up every time a tree fell on top of another with 
a great noise. The old trees became less dense, one 
could say they were mowed down by some gigantic 
and supernatural scythe. Two men were killed by the 
fall of an oak tree. 

And the few trees which remained standing, austere 
in the midst of ruined trunks lying on the ground, and 
the twisted branches which rose up towards them like 
arms outstretched in supplication, were showing open 
wounds, deep and red gashes from which the sap was 
oozing, weeping as it were. 


60 CALVARY 


The supervisor of the forest section, warned by a 
guard, came running from Senonches, and with a 
broken heart witnessed this useless devastation. I 
was near the general when the forester approached 
him respectfully, kepi in hand. 

“ Beg pardon, general,” said he. “I can understand 
the felling of trees on the edge of the road, the barri- 
cading of lines of approach. ... But your destruction 
of the heart of the old forest seems to me a little. . . .” 

But the general interrupted: 

“Eh? What? It seems to you what? ... What are 
you butting in here for?... I do asI please.... Who 
is commander here, you or I?.. .” 

“ But. . . .” stammered the forester. 


“There are no buts about it, Monsieur. ... You 
make me tired, that’s one thing sure! ... You had 
better hurry back to Senonches or I’ll have you strung 
up on a tree.... Come on, boys!...” 


The general turned his back on the stupefied agent 
and walked away knocking some dead leaves and 
sprigs before him with the end of his cane. 

While we were thus desecrating the forest, the 
chasseurs were not idle either, and the barricade rose, 
huge and formidable, cutting off the road at the cross- 
road. It was accomplished not without difficulty and 
above all not without gayety. Suddenly halted by a 
trench which barred their flight, the peasants pro- 
tested. Their carts and herds became congested on 
the road, very narrow at this point; there was, there- 
fore, an indescribable uproar. They were complain- 
ing, the women were moaning, the cattle were lowing, 
the soldiers were laughing at the frightened looks 
of men and beasts, and the captain who was in com- 
mand of the troops did not know what action to take. 
Several times the soldiers pretended to drive the peas- 
ants back at the point of the bayonet, but the latter 


CALVARY 61 


were stubborn and determined to pass and invoked 
their rights as Frenchmen. Having made his round 
in the forest, the general went to see the progress 
of the work on the barricade. He demanded to know 
what “these dirty civilians” wanted. He was told 
about it. 

“All right,” he cried. “Seize all their carts and 
throw them into the barricade. . . . Come on, get a 
move on you, boys!...” 

The soldiers, rejoicing in the opportunity, hurled 
themselves on the first carts which stood abandoned 
with everything in them, and smashed them with a 
few blows of the pick-axe. A wild panic broke out 
among the peasants. The congestion became so great 
that it was impossible for them either to advance or 
to turn back. Lashing their horses with all their 
might and trying to extricate their impeded wagons, 
they were shouting, jostling and bruising one another 
without making a step backward. Those last arrived 
had turned back and were going at full speed of their 
horses excited by the tumult; others, despairing of 
a chance to save their carts and provisions, climbed 
over the barrier and, dispersing across the field, 
uttered cries of indignation, pursued by oaths and 
curses flung at them by the soldiers. Then, they piled 
up the smashed vehicles one on top of the other, filled 
the gaps with sacks of oats, matresses, bundles of 
clothes and stones. On top of the barricade, upon a 
coach pole, which rose vertically upward like a flag- 
staff, a little chasseur planted a bouquet of wedding 
flowers found among other booty. 

Towards the evening, groups of reserves arriving 
from Chartres in great disorder, scattered all over 
Belhomert and the camp. They brought horrible 
tales. The Prussians were more than a hundred thou- 
sand strong, all in one army. They, the reserves, 


62 CALVARY 


hardly had time to fall back. ... Chartres was in 
flames, the villages in the vicinity were burning, the 
farms were destroyed. The greater part of the French 
detachments which bore the brunt of covering the 
retreat, could not hold out much longer. The fugi- 
tives were questioned; they were asked whether they 
saw the Prussians, what insignia they wore and were 
particularly quizzed about all the details of the enemy 
uniforms. 

Every fifteen minutes new reserves would show up 
in groups of two or three, pale, exhausted with fatigue. 
Most of them had no kits, some had no guns, and 
they were telling stories, each more terrible than the 
other. None of them was wounded. It was decided to 
quarter them in the church, to the great indignation 
of the curé who, lifting his arms to heaven, exclaimed: 

“Holy Virgin! ... In my church! .., Ah! Ah! 
Soldiers in my church!...” 

Up to this time the general who was preoccupied 
solely with his plans of destruction, had no time to 
provide for the guarding of the camp, except by es-. 
tablishing a small outpost in a tavern, frequented by 
carterers within a mile from Belhomert upon the 
Chartres road. This outpost, commanded by a ser- 
geant, had not received any definite instructions, and 
the man did nothing except loaf, drink and sleep. Still 
the sentinel who was nonchalantly pacing to and fro 
in front of the tavern, gun on shoulder, at one time 
arrested a country doctor as a German spy because 
of his blond beard and blue spectacles. As for the 
sergeant, an old professional poacher who sneered at 
everything and everybody, he amused himself by set- 
ting traps for rabbits in the hedges nearby. 

The arrival of the reserves, the menace of the Prus- 
sians had thrown us into confusion. Messengers came 
up every minute, carrying sealed envelopes containing 


CALVARY 63 


orders and counter-orders. The officers were running 
about with a preoccupied look, not knowing what to 
do, and completely lost their heads. Three times we 
were ordered to break up camp and three times we 
were told to pitch our tents anew. All night trumpets 
and bugles were sounding, and big log fires were burn- 
ing, around which, in the growing tumult, were 
passing back and forth shadows strangely agitated, 
silhouettes of demoniacal appearances. Patrols were 
scouring the fields, riding out on the crossroads, 
searching the outskirts of the forest. Artillery sta- 
tioned on this side of the town was ordered to move 
up forward upon the heights, but it ran into the barri- 
cade. To clear the way for the cannons, it was found 
necessary to demolish it piece-meal and to fill up the 
ditch. 

At daybreak my company was sent to do main 
guard duty. We met mobilized soldiers, dispirited 
franc-tireurs who were dragging their feet piteously. 
A little further away, the general, accompanied by 
his staff, was watching the manceuvres of the artillery. 
He held a map of the general staff, unfolded on the 
neck of his horse, and was vainly trying to locate the 
Saussaie mill. Bending over the map which the horse 
shifted out of place with every movement of its head, 
he shouted: 

“Where is that damned mill? ... Pontgouin.... 
Couville. ... Courville.... Do they think I know 
all their damned mills around here?” 

The general commanded us to halt and asked: 

“Ts there anyone here who is familiar with this 
country?... Is there anyone here who knows where 
the Saussaie mill is?” 

Nobody answered. 

“No?... Well alright. To hell with it!” 


64 CALVARY 


And he threw the map to his aide who began fold- 
ing it up carefully. We resumed our march. 

The company was stationed on a farm and I was 
put on guard duty near the road, at the entrance to a 
grove, beyond which I could look on an open plain, 
immense and smooth like the sea. Here and there 
small woods emerged from the ocean of land like isl- 
ands; the belfries of the villages, the farms, blurred 
by the fog, assumed the aspect of a distant veil. In 
this enormous expanse a great silence reigned, a soli- 
tude wherein the least noise, the least thing stirring in 
the skies, had something mysterious about it which 
put anguish into one’s heart. Up above, black dots 
spotted the skies — those were the ravens; down be- 
low, upon the earth, small black specks moved for- 
ward, growing larger, disappearing — those were the 
fleeing soldiers of the reserves; and now and then 
the distant barking of dogs, answered by similar bark- 
ing all along the line from east to west, from north 
to south, sounded like the plaint of the deserted fields. 
Our guard was supposed to be relieved every four 
hours, but hours upon hours passed, slow and endless, 
and no one came to take my place. 

No doubt they had forgotten all about me. With a 
heavy heart I was searching the horizon on the Prus- 
sian side, the French side; I saw nothing, nothing but 
this hard, relentless line, which encircled the huge 
grey sky around me. It was a long time since the 
ravens had ceased flying and the reserve soldiers flee- 
ing. For a moment I saw a truck coming toward the 
woods where I was, but it turned off on one of the 
roads and soon was no longer distinguishable from 
the grey terrain.... Why did they leave me thus? 
...1 was hungry and I was cold, my bowels rumbled, 
my fingers became numb. I ventured out on the road 
a little; having walked a few steps I shouted.... Not 


CALVARY 65 


a being answered my call, not a thing stirred.... I 
was alone, utterly alone, alone in this deserted, empty 
field. ... A shudder passed through my frame, and 
tears came into my eyes.... I shouted again.... No 
answer.... Then I went back into the woods and sat 
down at the foot of an oak tree, with my rifle across 
my lap, keeping a sharp lookout and waiting. ... Alas! 
The day was waning little by little, the sky grew yel- 
low, then purple by degrees and finally vanished in 
deadly silence. And night, moonless and starless, fell 
upon the fields, and at the same time a chilling fog 
arose from the shadows. 

Worn out with fatigue, always occupied with some- 
thing or other and never alone, I had no time to reflect 
on anything from the moment we started out. But 
still confronted by the strange and cruel sights con- 
stantly before my eyes, I felt within me the awakening 
of the idea of human life which until now had lain 
slumbering in the sluggishness of my childhood and 
the torpor of my youth. Yes... the idea awoke con- 
fusedly, as if emerging from a long and painful night- 
mare. And reality appeared to me more frightful than 
the nightmare. Transposing the instincts, the desires 
and passions which agitated us from the small group 
of errant men that we were to society as a whole, re- 
calling the impressions so fleeting and wholly external 
which I had received in Paris, the rude crowds, the 
pushing and jostling of pedestrians, I understood that 
the law of the world was strife; an inexorable, mur- 
derous law, which was not content with arming nation 
against nation but which hurled against one another 
the children of the same race, the same family, the 
same womb. I found none of the lofty abstractions 
of honor, justice, charity, patriotism of which our 
standard books are so full, on which we are brought 
up, with which we are lulled to sleep, through which 


66 CALVARY 


they hypnotize us in order the better to deceive the 
kind little folk, to enslave them the more easily, to 
butcher them the more foully. 

What was this country, in whose name so many 
crimes were being committed, which had torn us — 
formerly so full of love—from the motherly bosom 
of nature, which had thrown us, now so full of hatred, 
famished and naked, upon this cruel land? . . . What 
was this country, personified to us by this rabid and 
pillaging general who gave vent to his madness on 
old people and trees, and by this surgeon who kicked 
the sick with his feet and maltreated poor old mothers 
bereaved of their sons? ... What was this country 
every step on whose soil was marked by a grave, 
which had but to look at the tranquil waters of its 
streams to change them into blood, which was always 
frittering away its man power, digging here and there 
deep charnel vaults where the best children of men 
were rotting? . . . And I was astounded, when for the 
first time it dawned upon me that only those were the 
most glorious, the most acclaimed heroes of mankind 
who had pillaged the most, killed the most, burned the 
most. 

They condemn to death the stealthy murderer who 
kills the passerby with a knife, on the corner of the 
street at night, and they throw his beheaded body 
into a grave of infamy. But the conqueror who has 
burned cities and decimated human beings, all the 
folly and human cowardice unite in raising to the 
throne of the most marvelous; in his honor triumphal 
arches are built, giddy columns of bronze are erected, 
and in the cathedrals multitudes reverently kneel be- 
fore his tomb of hallowed marble guarded by saints 
and angels under the delighted gaze of God! ... With 
what remorse did I repent of the fact that until now 
I had remained blind and deaf to this life so full of 


CALVARY 67 


inexplicable riddles! Never had I opposed this mys- 
terious book, never had I stopped even for a single 
moment to consider the question marks which are 
represented by things and beings; I did not know 
anything. And now, suddenly, a desire to know, a 
yearning to wrest from life some of its enigmas tor- 
mented me; I wanted to know the human reason for 
creeds which stupefy, for governments which oppress, 
for society which kills; I longed to be through with 
this war so that I might consecrate myself to some 
ardent cause, to some magnificent and absurd apostle- 
ship. 

My thought traveled toward impossible philosophies 
of love, toward utopias of undying brotherhood.... I 
saw all men bent down beneath some crushing heels; 
they all resembled the little soldier of the reserves at 
Saint-Michel, whose eyes were running, who was 
coughing and spitting blood, and as I knew nothing 
of the necessity of higher laws of nature, a feeling of 
compassion rose within me, clogging my throat with 
suppressed sobs. I have noticed that a man has no- 
real compassion for anyone except when he himself is 
unhappy. Was this not, after all, but a form of self- 
pity? And if on this cold night, close to the enemy 
who would perhaps come out of the fogs of the mor- 
row, I loved humanity so much — was it not myself 
only that I loved, myself only that I wanted to save 
from suffering? These regrets of the past, these plans 
for the future, this sudden passion for study, this 
ardor which I employed in picturing myself in the 
future in my room on the Rue Oudinot, in the midst of 
books and papers, my eyes burning with the fever of 
work — was this not after all only a means to ward 
off the perils of the present, to dispel other horrible 
visions, visions of death which, blurred and blunted, 


68 CALVARY 


incessantly followed one another in the terror of 
darkness? 

Night, impenetrable night continued. Under the 
sky which brooded over them, sinister and greedy, 
the fields stretched like a vast sea of Shadow. At long 
intervals, out of the dead whiteness, long curtains of 
fog were floating up above, grazing the invisible 
ground where clumps of trees here and there appeared 
still darker in the surrounding darkness. I never 
stirred from the place where I sat down, and the cold 
numbed my members and chapped my lips. With 
difficulty I raised myself and walked on the outskirt 
of the woods. The sound of my own steps on the 
ground frightened me, it always seemed to me that 
someone was walking behind me. I was walking 
carefully, on tiptoe, as if afraid to wake the sleeping 
earth, and listened, trying to penetrate the darkness, 
for in spite of everything, I had not yet given up the 
hope that some one would come to relieve me. Nota 
stir, not a breath, not a glimmer of light in this blind 
and mute night. Twice, however, I distinctly heard 
the sound of steps, and my heart thumped violently. 
... But the noise moved away, grew fainter by de- 
grees, ceased altogether and silence set in again, more 
oppressive, more terrible, more disheartening than 
ever. 

A branch brushed against my face; I recoiled, 
seized with terror. Further away, a rise in the ground 
appeared to me like a man who with crooked back 
seemed to be crawling toward me; I loaded my rifle. 
...At the sight of an abandoned plough with its arms 
turned upward toward the sky, like the menacing 
horns of some monster, my breath left me and I al- 
most fell on my back.... I was afraid of the shadow, 
of the silence, of the least object that extended beyond 
the line of the horizon and which my deranged imag- 


CALVARY 69 


ination endowed with a soul of sinister life.... De- 
spite the cold, perspiration in large drops was stream- 
ing upon my face.... I had a notion to quit my post, 
to return to camp, persuading myself by all sorts of 
ingenious and cowardly arguments that my comrades 
had forgotten all about me and that they would be 
glad to see me back with them. Obviously, since I 
had not been relieved by anyone from my company, 
and saw none of the officers make his round of inspec- 
tion, they must have left.... But supposing I were 
mistaken about it, what excuse could I offer, and how 
would I be received at the camp?... To go back to 
the farm where my company was quartered this morn- 
ing and ask for instructions?... I was thinking of 
doing it.... But in my plight I had lost all sense of 
direction, and if I attempted to do that I would surely 
get lost in this plain that was so endless and so black. 

Then an abominable thought flashed through my 
mind.... Yes, why not discharge a bullet into my 
arm and run back, bleeding and wounded, and tell 
them that I had been attacked by the Prussians?... I 
had to make a strong effort to regain my reason which 
was leaving me; I had to gather all the moral forces 
that were left in me in order to get away from this 
cowardly and odious impulse, from this wretched ecs- 
tasy of fear, and I desperately strove to recall the 
memories of former times, to conjure up gentle and 
silent visions, sweet-scented and white-winged. .. . 
They came to me as in a painful dream, distorted, 
mutilated, under the spell of hallucination, and fear 
immediately threw them into confusion.... The Vir- 
gin of Saint-Michel, with a body of pink, in a blue 
mantle, adorned with golden stars, I saw in a lewd 
attitude, prostituting herself on a bed, in some miser- 
able shack, with drunken soldiers. My favorite spots 
in the Tourouvre forest, so peaceful, where I used to 


70 CALVARY 


stay for entire days, stretched out on the mossy 
ground, were turning topsy-turvy, tangled up, brand- 
ishing their gigantic trees over me; then a few how- 
itzer shells crossed one another in the air, resembling 
familiar faces which sniggered ; one of these projectiles 
suddenly spread out wide wings, flame-colored, which 
swung around me and enveloped me.... I cried out. 
... My God, am I going crazy? I felt my breast, my 
chest, my back, my legs.... I must have been as pale 
as a corpse, and I felt a shiver passing through me 
from heart to brain, like a steel bore. ... 

“Let’s see now,” I said aloud to myself to make 
sure that I was awake, that I was alive.... In two 
gulps I swallowed the remainder of the whiskey in my 
flask, and I started to walk very fast, tramping with 
rage upon the clods under my feet, whistling the air 
of a soldier song which we used to sing in chorus to 
relieve the tedium of the march. Somewhat calmed, 
I came back to the oak tree and kicked its trunk with 
the sole of my boots; for I was in need of this noise 
and this physical motion.... And now I thought of 
my father so lonely at the Priory. It was more than 
three weeks since I had received a letter from him. 
Oh! How sad and heart-rending his last letter was! 

It did not complain of anything, but one felt in 
it a deep despair, a wearisomeness of being alone in 
that large empty house, and anxiety about me who, 
he knew, was wandering, knapsack on back, amidst 
the dangers of battle.... Poor father! He had not 
been happy with my mother— who was ill, always 
fretful, who did not love him and could not stand his 
presence.... And never a sign of reproach, not even 
when meeting with the most painful rebuff and un- 
kindness! ... He used to bend his back like a dog, 
and walk out.... 

_ Ah! how I repented of the fact that I did not love 


CALVARY 71 


him enough. Perhaps he had not brought me up in 
the manner he should have done. But what difference 
did it make? He did everything he could!... He 
was himself without experience in life, defenseless 
against evil, of a kindly but timid nature. And in the 
measure that the features of my father stood out 
clearly before me even to their smallest details, the 
face of my mother was obliterating itself, and I was 
no longer able to recall its endearing outline. At this 
moment all the affection that I had for my mother I 
transferred to my father. I recalled with tenderness 
how on the day my mother died he took me on his 
lap and said, “ Perhaps it’s for the best.” And now I 
understood how much sorrow accumulated in the past 
and terror in facing the future there was summed up 
in that phrase. It was for her sake that he said that, 
and also for the sake of one who resembled my mother 
so much, and not for his own consolation, unhappy 
man that he was, who had resigned himself to suffer- 
ing all.... During the last three years he had aged 
very much; his tall frame was worn out, his. face, 
formerly so red with the color of health, grew yellow 
and wrinkled, his hair became almost white. He no 
longer lay in wait for the birds in the park, he let the 
cats rove among the lianas and lick the water from 
the basin; he took little interest in his practice, the 
direction of which he left to his chief clerk, a trusted 
man who was stealing from him; he no longer occu- 
pied himself with the small but honorable affairs of 
his locality. He never went out, he would not even 
stir from his rocking-chair with small pillows which 
he ordered moved into the kitchen, not wishing to 
stay alone— without Marie who would bring him 
his cane and his hat. 

“ Well, Monsieur, you must take a little walk. You 
are getting all ‘rusty’ in your corner there,...” 


72 CALVARY 


“ All right, Marie. I am going to take the air.... 
I’ll walk along the bank of the river, if you want me 
tp.” 

“No, Monsieur, you must take a walk in the woods. 
... The air there will do you good.” 

“ All right, Marie, I am going to take a walk in the 
woods.” 

At times, seeing him inactive, slumbering, she would 
tap him on the shoulder: 

“Why don’t you get your rifle, Monsieur? There 
are a lot of finches in the park.” 

And looking at her with an air of reproach, my 
father would mutter: 

“ Finches?... The poor things!...” 

Why did my father not write to me? Did my let- 
ters reach him at all? I reproached myself with hav- 
ing been too dry in my letters until now, and I prom- 
ised myself to write to him the next day — the first 
opportunity I got — a long affectionate letter, in which 
I was going to pour out my heart to him. 

The sky was gradually clearing way yonder on the 
horizon whose outline stood out clear against a darker 
blue. It was still night, the fields remained dark, but 
one could feel the approaching dawn. The cold was 
more piercing than ever, the earth cracked harder 
under the feet, moisture crystallized into drops on the 
branches of the trees. And little by little the sky 
was brightened by a faint glimmer of pale-gold color 
which was growing in distinctness. Gradually, out- 
lines emerged from the shadow, indefinite and con- 
fused as yet, the opaque blackness of the plain 
changed into a dull violet, here and there rent by 
light. ... Suddenly I heard a noise, weak at first, 
like the distant roll of a drum. ... I listened, my 
heart beating violently. Presently the noise stopped 
and the cocks crowed. ... About ten minutes later 


CALVARY 73 


the noise started again, more distinct, coming nearer! 
... Pa-ta-ra! Pa-ta-ra! It was the gallop of a horse 
on the Chartres road.... Instinctively I buckled up 
my knapsack on my back and made sure that my rifle 
was loaded. ... I was very excited, the veins in my 
temples dilated.... Pa-ta-ra! Pa-ta-ra!... 

Hardly had I time enough to squat down behind 
the oak tree, when on the road, at a distance of twenty 
paces in front of me, there suddenly appeared a large 
shadow, surprisingly immobile, like an equestrian 
statue of bronze, and this enormous shadow which 
obtruded itself almost entirely upon the brightness of 
the eastern sky was terrible to behold.... The man 
appeared to me superhuman, inordinately large against 
the sky! ... He wore the flat cap of the Prussians, a 
long black cloak, under which the chest was bulging 
out greatly. Was he an officer or a plain soldier? I 
did not know, for I could not distinguish any insignia 
of rank on the dark uniform. ... His features, at first 
indistinct, became more accentuated. He had clear 
eyes, very limpid, a broad beard, his bearing bespoke 
youthful strength; his face breathed power and kind- 
ness along with something noble, audacious and sad 
which struck me. Holding his hand flat on his thigh, 
he studied the country before him, and his horse 
scraped the ground with its hoofs and puffed long 
streams of vapor in the air through its quivering nos- 
trils. . . . Evidently this Prussian was reconnoitering, 
he came to observe our position, the nature of the 
ground; undoubtedly a whole army was swarming 
behind him, waiting for a signal from this man to 
throw themselves on the plain! ... 

Well hidden in my woods, with rifle ready, I was 
watching him. ... He was handsome indeed, life 
flowed abundantly in this robust body. ... Whata 
pity! He kept on studying the country, and it seemed 


74 CALVARY 


to me as though he were studying it more like a poet 
than a soldier. ... I detected a sort of emotion in 
his eyes. ... Perhaps he forgot why he had come 
here and allowed himself to be fascinated by the 
beauty of this virginal and triumphant dawn. The 
sky became all red, it blazed up gloriously, the awak- 
ened fields unrolled themselves in the distance, emerg- 
ing one after another from their veil of mist, rose- 
colored and blue, which floated like long scarves ruf- 
fled by invisible hands. The trees were dripping dew, 
the hovels separated themselves from the pink and 
blue background, the dove-cot of a large farm whose 
new tile roofs began to glitter, projected its whitish 
cone into the purple glare of the east.... Yes, this 
Prussian who started out with the notion to kill, was 
arrested, dazzled and reverently stirred by the splen- 
dor of a new-born day, and his soul for a few minutes 
was the captive of love. 

“Perhaps it’s a poet,” I said to myself, “an artist; 
he must be kind, since he is capable of tenderness.” 

And upon his face I could see all the emotion of a 
brave man which agitated him, all the tremors, all the 
delicate and flitting reactions of his heart, moved and 
fascinated.... I feared him no longer. On the con- 
trary, a sort of infatuation drew me towards him, and 
I had to hold on to the tree to keep myself from going 
to this man. I would have liked to speak to him, to 
tell him that it was well that he contemplated the 
heaven thus, and that I liked him because of his re- 
ceptiveness to beauty.... But his face grew sombre, 
a sadness stole into his eyes.... Ah, the horizon over 
which they swept was so far, so far away! And be- 
yond that horizon there was another and further on, 
still another! One had to conquer all that!... When 
was he to be relieved of his duty ever to spur his horse 
on through this nostalgic territory, always to cut a 


CALVARY 75 


way through ruins and through death, always to kill, 
always to be cursed!... 

And then, undoubtedly, he was thinking of the 
things he had left behind; of his home resounding 
with the laughter of his children, of his wife, who was 
waiting for him and praying to God while doing so.... 
Will he ever see her again? ... I was sure that at 
this very moment he was recalling the most fugitive 
details, the most childish habits of his life at home... 
a rose plucked one evening, after dinner, with which 
he adorned the hair of his wife, the dress which she 
wore when he was leaving, a blue bow on the hat of 
his little daughter, a wooden horse, a tree, a river 
view, a paper knife! ... All the memories of his joys 
came back to him, and with that keenness of vision 
which exiled persons possess, he encompassed in a 
single mental glance of despondency all those things 
by means of which he had been happy until now. ... 

The sun rose higher, rendering the plain larger, ex- 
tending the distant horizon still farther.... I felt a 
compassion for this man and I loved him... yes I 
swear I loved him! ... Well, then, how did that 
happen? ... A detonation was suddenly heard, and 
at that very moment I caught sight of a boot in 
the air, of a torn piece of a military cloak, of a mane 
flying about wildly on the road ... and then nothing, 
I heard the noise of a blow with a sabre, the heavy 
fall of a body, furious beats of a gallop ... then noth- 
ing.... My rifle was warm, and smoke was coming 
out of it.... I let it fall to the ground.... Was I 
the victim of hallucination? ... Clearly not. Of the 
large shadow which rose skyward at the middle of the 
road like an equestrian statue of bronze there was 
left but a small corpse all black, stretched out face 
downward, with crossed arms. ... I recalled the 
poor cat that my father had killed, when with fasci- 


76 CALVARY 


nated eyes she had been following the flight of a 
butterfly... . 

Stupidly, unconsciously, I had killed a man whom 
I loved, a man with whom my soul had just identified 
itself, a man who in the dazzling splendor of the rising 
sun was retracing the purest dreams of his life! ... 
Perhaps I had killed him at the very moment that that 
man had said to himself: “And when I shall see her 
again at home... .” Why? For what reason? Since 
I loved him, since, if soldiers had menaced him, I 
would have defended him! Why of all men was it 
he I assassinated? In two bounds I was beside this 
man; I called him... he did not move. My bullet 
had pierced his neck under the ear, and blood was 
gushing from an opened vein with a gurgling sound, 
collecting into a red pool and sticking to his beard. ... 
With trembling hands I raised him slowly, his head 
swung from side to side, fell back, inert and heavy... . 
I felt his chest where the heart was: it beat no longer. 
... Then I raised him again, supporting his head with 
my knees, and suddenly I saw his eyes, his two clear 
eyes which looked at me sadly, without hatred, with- 
out reproach, his two eyes which seemed to be alive! 
.. . I thought I was going to faint, but gathering all 
my strength in a supreme effort, I clasped the dead 
body of the Prussian, placed it right in front of me 
and pressing my lips against this bleeding face from 
which long, purple threads of congealed slaver were 
hanging, I desperately kissed it!... 

From this moment on I don’t remember anything. 
... I see again smoky fields covered with snow, and 
ruins burning incessantly, ever recurring dismal 
flights, delirious marches during the night, confusion 
at the crossroads congested with ammunition wagons, 
where the dragoons with drawn swords were driving 
their horses right into our midst and trying to cut a 


CALVARY 77 


way through the wagons; I see again funeral carriages, 
followed by dead bodies of young men which we buried 
in the frozen ground, saying to ourselves that tomorrow 
would be our turn; I see again, near the cannon car- 
riages, large carcasses of horses dismembered by how- 
itzer shells, stiff, cut up, over which we used to quar- 
rel in the evening, from which we used to carry away, 
into our tents, bleeding portions which we devoured 
growling, showing our teeth like wolves!... And I 
see again the surgeon, with sleeves of his white coat 
rolled up, pipe in mouth, amputating on a table, in a 
farmhouse, by the smoky light of a tallow candle, the 
foot of a little soldier still wearing his coarse shoes! 

. But above all I see again the Priory, when worn 
out and broken in body and spirit by these sufferings, 
rendered apathetic by the disaster of defeat I re-en- 
tered it one nice and sunny day.... The windows of 
the large house were closed, the window blinds were 
down in every room.... Felix, more bent than ever, 
was cleaning the walk and Marie, seated near the. 
kitchen door, was knitting a pair of stockings, wag- 
ging her head. 

“Well! Well!” I shouted, “is that the way you 
receive me!” 

As soon as the two noticed me, Felix went away as 
if frightened and Marie growing pale, uttered a cry. 

““What’s the matter?” I asked with a heavy heart. 
“ How about father? ” 

The old woman looked at me fixedly. 

“Why, don’t you know?... Haven’t you received 
anything?... Ah, my poor Monsieur Jean! My poor 
Monsieur Jean!” 

And with eyes filled with tears,. she stretched out 
her arms in the direction of the cemetery. 

“Yes! Yes! There is where he is now, with Ma- 
dame,” she said in a dull voice. 


CHAPTER III 


OC, toc, toc. 
And at the same time a small drawn otter 
skin bonnet appeared in the slight opening of 


the door, followed by two smiling eyes under a veil, 
then a long fur cape which outlined the slender body 
of a young woman. 

“Tam not disturbing you?... May I come in?” 

Lirat, the painter, raised his head. 

“ Ah! it’s you, Madame!” he said in a curt tone, 
almost irritated, while shaking his hands soiled with 
pastel. ‘“ Why, yes, certainly.... Come right in!” 

He left his easel and offered a seat. 

“ How is Charles?” he asked. 

_ “He is all right, thank you.” 

She sat down, smiling, and her smile was really 
charming as well as sad. Although covered with a 
veil, her clear eyes of pinkish blue, her very large eyes 
which illuminated her whole figure, seemed to be ra- 
diating infinite kindness. ... She was dressed very 
elegantly, without striving to be pretentious. A little 
over-perfumed, however. ... There was a moment 
of silence. 

The studio of the painter Lirat, situated in a peace- 
ful section of the Faubourg Saint Honoré, on Rodri- 
gues Square, was a vast, bare place with grey walls, 
with rough carpentry work and without furniture. 
Lirat called it familiarly “his hangar.” A hangar it 
was, indeed, where the north winds blew and the rain 
entered the room through the small crevices in the 
roof. Two long tables of plain wood supported boxes 
of paint, scrap books, blocks, handles of fans, Jap- 


CALVARY 79 


anese albums, casts, a mess of odd and useless things. 
Near a book case filled with old magazines in a cor- 
ner there was a pile of pasteboard, canvas, torn 
sketches with the stretchers sticking through. A shat- 
tered sofa creaking with a sound like that of a piano 
out of tune, whenever one tried to sit on it, two-rickety 
arm chairs, a looking glass without a frame — con- 
stituted the only luxury of the studio illumined by 
trembling sunlight. In the winter, on days when Lirat 
had a model posing for him in the studio, he used to 
light his little cast iron stove whose chimney, crooked 
into several large bends, supported by iron wire and 
covered with rust, rose in a serpentine fashion in 
the middle of the room, before losing itself in the roof 
through an opening, all too large. On other days, 
even during the coldest nights, he substituted for the 
heat of the stove an old coat of astracan fur, worn out, 
bald and scabby, which he put on with real pleasure. 

Lirat took a childish pride in this dilapidated studio, © 
and he boasted of its bareness as other painters do of 
their embroidered plush and tapestries, invariably his- 
torical in origin. Nay, he even wanted it to be still 
less attractive, he wanted its floor to be the bare 
ground. “It is in my studio that I learn who my 
best friends are,” he would often say, “they always 
come again, the others stay away. That’s very con- 
venient.” Very few came more than once. 

The young woman was attractively seated in her 
chair, her bust slightly bent forward, her hands bu- 
ried in her muff; from time to time she would take 
out an embroidered handkerchief and bring it slowly 
to her mouth which I could not see because of the 
thick border of the veil which hid it, but which I 
surmised was very beautiful, very red and exquisitely 
shaped. In her whole figure, elegant and refined, 
about which, in spite of the smile which rendered it so 


80 CALVARY 


alluring, there was an air of modesty and even haugh- 
tiness, I could distinguish only these beautiful eyes 
which rested on objects like the rays of some heavenly 
star, and I followed her gaze which passed from the © 
floor to the frame work, so vibrant with luminosity 
and caresses. The embarrassing silence continued. 
I thought I alone was the cause of this embarrassment 
and I was getting ready to leave, when Lirat ex- 
claimed : 

“Ah! Pardon!... I have forgotten.... Dear 
Madame, allow me to introduce to you my friend Jean 
Mintié.” 

She greeted me with a gracious and at the same 
time coaxing nod of her head and in a very sweet 
voice, which thrilled me deliciously, she said: 

“Tam delighted to meet you, Monsieur, but I know 
you well.” 

While very much flushed, I was stammering out a 
few confused and silly words, Lirat broke in mock- 
ingly: 

“T hope you are not going to make him believe 
that you have read his book?” 

“T beg your pardon, Monsieur Lirat.... I have 
read it.... It is very good.” 

“Yes, like my studio and my painting, isn’t that 
right?” 

“Oh, no! what a comparison!” 

She said it frankly, with a laugh, which rolled 
through the room like the chirping of a bird. 

I did not like this laughter. Although it had a hard, 
sonorous quality, it nevertheless rang false. It seemed 
to me out of harmony with the expression of her face, 
so delicately sad, and then, in my admiration for 
Lirat’s genius it hurt me almost like an insult. I do 
not know why, but it would have been more pleasing 
to me if she had expressed her admiration for this 


CALVARY 81 


great unrecognized artist, if she had shown at this 
moment a loftier judgment, if she had evinced a sen- 
timent superior to those of other women. On the 
other hand the contemptuous manner of Lirat, his 
tone of bitter hostility, shocked me deeply! I had a 
grudge against him for this affected rudeness, for this 
attitude of boyish insolence which lowered him in my 
esteem, I thought. I was displeased and very much 
embarrassed. I tried to speak of indifferent things, 
but not a single object of conversation came to my 
mind. 

The young woman got up. She walked a few steps 
in the studio, stopped before the sketches lying in a 
heap, examined one or two of them with an air of 
disgust. 

““My God! Monsieur Lirat,” she said, “ why do you 
persist in painting such ugly women, so comically 
shaped?” 

“Tf I should tell you,” Lirat replied, “ you would 
not understand it.” | 

“Thanks! ... And when will you paint my por- 
trait?” 

“You should ask Monsieur Jacket or, better still, 
a photographer about that.” 

“Monsieur Lirat?” 

“ Madame!” 

“Do you know why I came?” 

“To oblige me with your kindness, I suppose.” 

“That’s in the first place!... And then?” 

“We seem to be playing an innocent little game? 
That’s very nice.” 

“To ask you to come to dine with me on Friday? 
Do you care to?” 

“You are very kind, dear Madame, but on Friday 
that is just when it will be utterly impossible. That’s 
my day at the Institute.” 


82 CALVARY 


“ Well, of all things! ... Charles will be hurt by 
your refusal.” 

“ You will express my regrets to him, will you not?” 

“Well, good bye, Monsieur Lirat! A person can 
freeze to death here.” 

And walking over to me, she gave me her hand. 

“ Monsieur Mintié. I am home every day, from 
five to seven!... I shall be delighted to see you... 
delighted... .” 

I bowed and thanked her, and she went out leav- 
ing in my ears some of the music of her voice, in my 
eyes some of the kindliness of her look and in the 
studio the strong perfume of her hair, of her cape, of 
her muff, of her small handkerchief. 

Lirat resumed his work without saying a word; I 
was turning over the pages of a book which I was 
not reading at all, and upon the moving pages there 
was flitting incessantly back and forth the image of 
the young visitor. I certainly was not asking myself 
what kind of an impression I had retained of her, nor 
whether I had retained any impression at all; but 
although she went out, she was not gone entirely. 
There was left with me an indefinite something of this 
short-lived apparition, something like a haze which 
assumed her form in which I could make out the 
shape of her head, the turn of the back of her neck, 
the movement of her shoulders, the graceful curve of 
her waistline, and that something haunted me.... I 
still beheld her in that chair which she had just left, 
unfathomable and more charming than ever, with her 
tender and luminous smile which radiated from her 
and created a halo of love about her: 

“ Who is that woman?” I suddenly asked, in a tone 
which I forced myself to render indifferent. 

“What woman?” said Lirat. 

“Why, the one that has just left.” 


CALVARY 83 


“Ah! Yes... my God! A woman just like others.” 

“JT should think so.... This does not tell me her 
name, however, nor who she is.” 

Lirat was rummaging in his paint box. He an- 
swered carelessly: 

“And so you want to know the name of that wom- 


an.... Strange curiosity! ... Her name is Juliette 
Roux.... As for biographical information, the police 
can furnish you all you want, I imagine.... I pre- 


sume that Juliette Roux gets up late, that she has her 
fortune told by cards, that she is deceiving and ruin- 
ing as well as she can that poor Charles Malterre, an 
excellent chap whom you met here sometime ago, and 
whose mistress she is, for the time being.... Lastly, 
she is like other women, only with this difference, 
which makes her case worse: she is more beautiful 
than most of them and consequently more foolish and 
more malicious. ... That sofa there, that you are 
sitting on ... it was Charles who broke it by lying 
and crying on it for entire days, while telling me his 
troubles, you understand? One day he caught her 
with a croupier of a gambling club, on another day 
with a buffoon at the Bouffes theatre. 

“There was also an affair with the wrestler of 
Neuilly, to whom she gave twenty francs and Charles’ 
old trousers. As you see, it’s full of idylls.... I like 
Malterre very much. . . because he is good-natured 
and his lack of sense evokes my pity.... He really 
has my sympathy.... But what can one say to such 
men, to whom love is the greatest thing in life and 
who can’t see a woman’s back without tacking on to it 
wings of dreams and sending it flying to the stars... . 
Nothing, isn’t that true? ... So much so that the 
unfortunate fellow, in the midst of his rage and sobs, 
could brag about the fact that Juliette had received a 
good education. He used to take pride in the fact 


84 CALVARY 


that she came from the womb of a physician’s wife 
and not from that of the wife of a janitor, and he 
would show me her letters, emphasizing the correct 
spelling and the elegant turn of phrases!... He 
seemed to say: ‘How I suffer, but how well written 
this is!’. . . What a pity!” 

“Ah! You, too, love the woman!” I exclaimed, 
when he finished his tirade. 

And foolishly, I added: 

“They say you have suffered much.” 

Lirat shrugged his shoulders and smiled: 

“ You talk like Delauney, of the Comédie-Frangaise. 
No, no, my kind friend, I have not suffered; I have 
seen others suffer, and that was enough for me... do 
you understand?” 

Suddenly his voice became shrill, an almost cruel 
light shone in his eyes. He resumed: 

“Ordinary people, poor devils like Charles Mal- 
terre, when stepped upon, are crushed, they disappear 
in the blood, in the mire, in the atrocious filth stirred 
up by woman’s hands. .. that’s unfortunate of course. 
.. . Humanity, however, does not claim them back; 


for nothing has been stolen from it.... But artists, 
men of our calibre with big hearts and big brains,— 
when these are lost, strangled, killed! ... You un- 
derstand?...” 


His hand trembled, he crushed his crayon on the 
canvas. 

“T have known three of them, three wonderful, di- 
vine ones; two died by hanging themselves; the third 
one, my teacher, is in a padded dark room at Bicétre! 
... Of this pure genius there has been left only a lump 
of wan flesh, a sort of raving beast who grimaces and 
hurls himself at you with froth at his mouth!... And 
in this crowd of cast-offs, how many young hopes have 
perished in the grasp of the beast of prey! Count 


CALVARY 85 


them up, all these lamentable, bewildered, maimed 
people; those who had wings and who are now crawl- 
ing on all fours; those who scrape the earth with their 
nails and feed on their own excrements! Why, you 


yourself ...a minute ago looked at Juliette with ecs- 
tasy ... you were ready to do anything for a kiss from 
her.... Don’t deny it, 1 saw you.... Oh! well, let’s 


go out; that’s enough, I can’t work any more.” 

He arose and paced across the studio in agitation. 
Gesticulating and angry, he upset the chairs and paste- 
boards, ripped some of his sketches with a kick. I 
thought he was going mad. His bloodshot eyes rolled 
wildly ; he was pale, and the words were coming out 
of his drawn-up mouth in a violent jumble. 


“For men to be born of woman... men!... How 
irrational! For men to be conceived in an impure 
womb!... For men to gorge themselves with wom- 


an’s vices, with her imbecile, ferocious appetites, to 
have sucked the sap of life from her nefarious breasts! 
Mother!... Ah! yes, mother!... Divinized mother, 
eh? Mother who creates us, sick and wasted race that 
we are, who stifles the man in the child and hurls us 
nailless and toothless, stupid and tamed, upon the 
bedstead of a mistress and the nuptial bed!...” 

Lirat stopped for a moment; he was choking. Then, 
bringing his hands together and knotting his crisp 
fingers in the air, as if gripping an imaginary neck, he 
shouted madly, terribly: 

“This is what should be done with them, all of 
them, all of them!... Do you understand?...eh... 
tell me?... Allofthem!...” 

And he began pacing back and forth again, swear- 
ing, stamping his feet. But the last shout of anger 
had evidently relieved him. 

“Come now, my dear Lirat, calm yourself,” I said 


86 CALVARY 


to him. ‘“ What’s the use of getting excited, and over 
what, I ask you? Come now, you are not a woman.” 

“That’s true, too, but you provoked me with this 
Juliette.... How does this Juliette concern you any- 
way?” 

“Was it not natural on my part to want to know 
the name of the person to whom you had introduced 
me?... And then, frankly, pending the invention of 
some other machine than woman for breeding chil- 
dren. 23.” 

“ Pending that ... I ama brute,” interrupted Lirat, 
who again seated himself before his easel, a little 
ashamed of himself, and in a quiet voice asked: 

“ Dear little Mintié, would you mind sitting for me 
a little. That won’t bore you, will it? For only ten 
minutes.” 

Joseph Lirat was forty-two years old. I made his 
acquaintance casually one evening; I no longer re- 
member where it was, and though he had the reputa- 
tion of being a misanthrope, unsociable and spiteful, 
I instantly took a fancy to him. Is it not painful to 
think that our deepest friendships, which ought to be 
the result of a long process of selection, that the gravest 
events in our life which should be brought about by 
a logical chain of causes, are for the most part, the 
instant result of chance? ... You are at home in your 
study, tranquilly absorbed in a book. Outside the sky 
is grey, the air is cold: it is raining, the wind is blow- 
ing, the street is gloomy and dirty, therefore you have 
every good reason in the world not to stir from your 


chair. ... Yet you go out, driven by weariness, by 
idleness, by something you yourself don’t know—by 
nothing, .. . and then at the end of a hundred steps, 


you meet the man, the woman, the carriage, the stone, 
the orange peel, the mud puddle which upsets your 
whole existence from top to bottom. 


CALVARY 87 


In the midst of the most sorrowful of my experi- 
ences I used to think of these things, and often I would 
say to myself—with what bitter regrets!—“If on the 
evening when I met Lirat, in the forgotten place where 
I certainly had nothing to do, I had but stayed at 
home and worked or dreamed or slept, I would have 
been today the happiest man on earth and there would 
have happened to me none of the things which did 
happen to me.” And that moment of trivial hesitancy, 
the moment when I was asking myself: “Shall I go 
out or shall I not?,” that moment embraced the most 
important act in my life; my whole destiny was de- 
termined in the brief space of time which in my memory 
left no more trace than a gust of wind, which blows 
down a house or uproots an oak tree, leaves upon the 
skies! I recall the most insignificant details of my 
life. For example, I remember the blue velvet suit, 
laced in front, which I wore on Sunday, when I was 
very little. I can swear, yes I can swear, that I could | 
count the grease spots on the habit of curé Blanche- 
tiére or even the number of tobacco grains he used 
to drop while snuffing up his pinch of snuff. 

It seems a senseless and yet disquieting thing: very 
often when I cry, or look at the sea or even watch the 
sunset upon an enchanted field—I can still see by that 
odious freak of irony which is at the bottom of our 
ideals, our dreams and our sufferings—lI can still see 
upon the nose of an old guard we had, father Lejars, 
a big tumor, grumous and funny with its four hair 
filaments which proved an excellent attraction for 
flies. ... Whereas the moment which decided my life, 
which cost me my peace, my honor, and reduced me 
to the position of a scabby dog; this moment which 
I passionately wish to reconstruct, to bring back again 
to memory with the aid of physical reminders and 
mental associations—this moment I cannot recall. 


88 CALVARY 


Thus it is that in the course of my life there happened 
a tremendous, a singular event, since all the subse- 
quent occurrences flow from it, and yet the recollec- 
tion of it escapes me entirely!... I remember neither 
the occasion, nor the place, nor the circumstances, nor 
the immediate cause of that event. ... What do I 
know then about myself? . . . What do people in gen- 
eral know about themselves, when they are hopelessly 
unable to trace the sources of their actions? Nothing, 
nothing, nothing! And must one explain the enigmas 
which our mental phenomena and the manifestation 
of our so-called will represent, by the promptings of 
this blind mysterious force, the fatality of human na- 
ture?... That is not speaking to the point, however. 

I said that I had met Lirat one evening by accident, 
in a place I don’t remember and that instantly I took 
a fancy to him.... He was the most original of men. 
... With his forbidding appearance, his machine-like 
and magisterial stiffness and his air of a petty official, 
he at first made the impression of a typical functionary, 
of some orleanist puppet such as are manufactured in 
the politicians’ clubs and drawing rooms for the punch 
and judy show of parliaments and academies. From 
a distance, he positively looked like one who is in the 
habit of distributing decorations, excize offices and 
prizes for valor! This impression, however, quickly 
disappeared ; for this it was sufficient to listen, if only 
for five minutes, to his conversation, lucid, colorful, 
bristling with original ideas, and above all to feel the 
power of his glance, his extraordinary glance, exhila- 
rated and cold at the same time, a glance to which all 
things seemed familiar, which went through you like 
a gimlet against your will. 

I liked him very much, only in my liking for him 
there was lacking the element of tenderness, of kindli- 
ness; I liked him with a sort of fear and uneasiness, 


CALVARY 89 


with a painful feeling that in his presence I did not 
amount to much and that I was eclipsed, so to speak, 
by the grandeur of his genius.... I liked him as one 
likes the sea, the tempest, as one likes some immense 
force of nature. Lirat inspired me with fear, his pres- 
ence paralyzed what little intellectual powers there 
were in me, for I was always afraid that I might say 
something foolish at which he would jeer. He was 
so severe, so relentless to everybody; he knew so well 
how to discover, to reveal the ridiculous side in artists, 
in writers whom I considered superior to myself, and 
to characterize them by some apt remark unforget- 
able and fierce, that in his presence I found myself in 
a state of constant mistrust, of ever present dis- 
quietude. I always asked myself: “‘ What does he think 
of me? What scornful thoughts do I inspire in him?” 

I had that feminine curiosity which obsessed me to 
know what opinion he had of me. By means of dis- 
tant allusions, absurd affections or hypocritical cir- 
cumlocutions, I would sometimes try to surprise or 
provoke him into frankness, and I suffered even more 
when he deigned to pay me a curt compliment, as one 
who throws a few pennies to a pauper whom one 
wishes to be rid of; at least, that is what I imagined. 
In a word, I liked him very much, I assure you; I was 
very much devoted to him, but in this affection and in 
this devotion there was an element of uncertainty, 
which destroyed the charm of those feelings; there 
was also a certain grudge which rendered those feel- 
ings almost painful, a grudge caused by the sense of 
my inferiority. Never, not even when I was most inti- 
mate with him, was I able to conquer that feeling of 
base and timid pride, never could I enjoy a friendship 
which I prized very highly. Lirat, on the other hand, 
was simple in his relations with me, often affectionate, 
sometimes “fatherly ” in his attentions, and of all his 


90 CALVARY 


friends, who were very few in number, I was the only 
one whose companionship he sought. 

Like all those who hold tradition in contempt, like 
all who rebel against the prejudices of conventional 
education, against the idiotic formule of the School, 
Lirat was very much discussed; spoken of with con- 
tempt—JI should rather say. It must be stated also 
that his conception of free and lofty art conflicted with 
all the professed conventions and accepted ideas, and 
that by their forceful synthesis and prodigious know- 
ledge of life which obscured his craftsmanship, his 
works of art disconcerted the lovers of prettiness and 
grace and of the frigid correctness of academic unity. 
The return of modern painting to the great gothic art 
— this they could never forgive him. 

He fashioned the man of today in his craving for 
enjoyment, a frightfully tortured soul with a body 
sapped by neurosis, with flesh tormented by lust, 
which quivers under the influence of passion that lures 
man on and sinks its claws into his skin. In his rep- 
resentations of the human body wrought in avenging 
postures, with monstrous apophyses guessed at under 
the garments, there was such human emphasis, such 
grief over infernal voluptuousness, such tragic power, 
that a shudder passed through one’s frame when look- 
ing at them. It was no longer curly headed, pomaded 
love, adorned with ribbons and fainting with yearning, 
rose in mouth, by the light of the moon, or strumming 
on a guitar under the balcony; it was Love besmirched 
with blood, drunk with the filth of vice, Love with 
its onanistic furies, wretched Love which fastens upon 
man its mouth like a cupping glass and drains his 
veins, sucks the marrow of his bones and emaciates his 
frame. And in order to give these representations a 
still greater intensity of horror, to weigh them down 
with the burden of even greater affliction, he cast them 


CALVARY 91 


in the midst of peaceful, smiling surroundings of sur- 
passing clearness, among pink and blue landscapes 
with softened vistas, amidst glorious sunshine, with 
the radiant sea in the background. All around them 
nature was resplendent with all the magic of her deli- 
cate and changing colors. 

When for the first time he consented to place his 
works on a free exhibit, together with a group of 
friends, the critics and the mob, which influences the 
critics, shouted with indignation. But the anger did 
not last very long — for there is a sort of nobility, or 
generosity in anger—and they merely contented them- 
selves with laughing. Then the humbug which is al- 
ways represented by mediocre opinion with its foul 
spittle, this humbug came to replace the menace ot 
raised fists. And viewing the superb artistry of Lirat, 
they were convulsed with laughter, holding their sides 
with both hands. Clever, merry-making people depos- 
ited pennies on the edge of the frames as one does for 
a Jack-in-the-box, and this was considered excellent 
sport —for it actually became a sport for people of 
the better sort, with purses. 

In the magazines, in the studios, in the salons, in 
the clubs and the cafés the name of Lirat served as a 
term of comparison, as an indispensable standard 
whenever one wanted to designate something devoid 
of sense or some sort of obscenity; it even seemed as if 
women —and girls too—could not pronounce that 
reprobate name without blushing. The year-end re- 
views dragged it into their revolting lampoons, people 
sang it at the cabarets. Then from these “ centres of 
Parisian culture” it spread to the street — where one 
saw it blossom forth again into a vulgar bud, upon 
the sloppy lips of drivers, in the shriveled mouths of 
street boys, “It’s a go, eh! Lirat!” For a few years 
poor Lirat really enjoyed an uproarious popularity. . . 


92 + CALVARY 


But one gets tired of everything, even of abusing a 
person. Paris abandons its puppets which it raises to 
the throne as quickly as it does its martyrs whom it 
hoists on the gibbet; in its perpetual hunger for new 
playthings, it never gets itself excited overly much be- 
fore the statues of its heroes or at the sight of the 
blood of its victims. 

Now there was only silence for Lirat’s portion. It 
was very seldom indeed that in some of the magazines 
there was again heard an echo of the past, in the form 
of some annoying anecdote. Besides, he decided not 
to exhibit any more, saying: 

“Leave me alone in peace!.. Is painting done to 
_ be seen..tell me..painting..do you understand?... 
One works for himself, for two or three living friends 
and for others whom one has never known and who 


are dead... Poe, Baudelaire, Dostoiewsky, Shake- 
speare. . . . Shakespeare! . . do you understand? ... 
And the rest?... The rest don’t amount to any- 
thing. ” 


Having reduced his needs to a minimum, he lived 
on little with admirable and touching dignity. Pro- 
vided he earned enough with which to buy his brushes, 
paints, canyas, pay his models and his landlord, make 
a studying trip each year, he did not wish for more. 
Money did not tempt him at all, and I am sure that he 
never sought success. But if success had come to 
him, I am also sure that Lirat would not have resisted 
the joy, so human, of relishing factitious delights. 
Though he did not want to admit it, though he af- 
fected to defy injustice gayly, he felt it more keenly 
than anyone else, and at heart suffered from it cruelly. 
He suffered from the present neglect shown to him 
as much as he had suffered from the former insults. 
Only once did a young critic publish an enthusiastic 
and high-sounding article about him in a magazine. 


CALVARY 93 


The article was well-meant but full of banalities and 
errors; one could see that its author was not suffi- 
ciently familiar with art and that he did not under- 
stand anything about the talent of the great artist. 

“Have you read it?” Lirat shouted, “have you 
read it, eh, tell me?... What idiots these critics are! 
... If they keep on talking about me, they will finally 
force me to paint in a cave, understand?... What do 
they take me for anyway—a vulgarizer?... And then 
what business is it of this fellow here—whether I 
make paintings, boots or slippers? ... That’s my 
private affair!” 

Nevertheless he had put it away in a drawer as a 
thing of great value, and several times I surprised him 
reading it. It was very well for him to say with 
supreme detachment, when we were inveighing 
against the stupidity of the public: “ Well, what would 
you want them to do?... Do you expect the people 
to start a revolution because I paint my canvases 
plainly?” But in reality this contempt for notoriety, 
this apparent resignation concealed deep but secret 
sentiment. Deep in his very sensitive and very gen- 
erous soul there accumulated profound aversions, 
which were vented with terrible and malignant fer- 
vor on the whole world. If, on the one hand, his 
talent had gained in strength and ruggedness on ac- 
count of this, his. character, on the other hand, had 
lost something of its inherent nobility, and his critical 
spirit had been deprived of some of its penetrating 
quality and brilliance. 

He ended by giving himself over entirely to decry- 
ing everybody and everything, the excess of which 
threatened to render him odious; at times it bore 
evidence of nothing but a childishness which made 
him ridiculous. Great souls nearly always have petty 
weaknesses — that is a mysterious law of nature, and 


94 CALVARY 


Lirat did not escape the effects of this law. Above 
everything else, he held fast to his well-established 
reputation of an ill-natured man. He bore very well 
with the opinion which denied him talent, but what 
he could not tolerate was that they called in question 
the propriety of his insulting humanity with his sar- 
castic jibes. 

To avenge the scouring words with which he 
characterized them, some of the enemies of Lirat attrib- 
uted to him unnatural vices; others simply called him 
an epileptic, and these coarse and cowardly calumnies, 
strengthened every day by ingenious comments, 
based on “certain” stories which made the rounds of 
the studios — these calumnies found ready listeners 
willing, some owing to his actual malice, others 
prompted solely by the intemperance of the painter’s 
tongue, to receive and spread them. 

“You know Lirat?.... He had another attack 
yesterday, this time on the street.” 

And names of important personages were mentioned 
who had assisted in the scene and who had seen him 
rolling in the mud, lying, with foam at his mouth. 

I must confess that I myself at the beginning of our 
friendship was greatly troubled by these stories. I 
could not think of Lirat without at the same time pic- 
turing to myself horrible fits in which, I was told, he 
was writhing. Victim of a delusion born of an obses- 
sion with this idea, I seemed to discover in him symp- 
toms of horrible diseases; I often imagined that he 
suddenly became livid, that his mouth was distorted, 
that his body was convulsed in horrible spasms, that 
his eyes, wild and streaked with red, were shunning 
the light and seeking the shadow of deep vacuous 
space, like the eyes of trapped beasts that are about 
to die. And I regretted that I did not see him fall, 
shriek, writhe here in his studio filled with his genius, 


CALVARY 95 


under my avid glance that watched him and hoped 
for the worst!... Poor Lirat!.. And still I loved 
him!... 

The day was drawing to a close. All over Rodri- 
gues place one heard the slamming of doors; the 
noise of steps upon the street was rapidly dying away, 
and in the shops voices were heard rising in song at 
the end of the day’s work. Lirat had not uttered a 
word since resuming his work, except to fix my pos- 
ture, which I did not keep just the way he wanted. 

“ The leg a little this way!... A little more now! 

. Your chest not quite so drawn in!.... You'll 
excuse me, my dear Mintié, but you pose like a pig!” 

He worked now feverishly, now haltingly, mum- 
bling in his mustache, swearing from time to time. His 
crayon snapped at the canvas with a sort of uneasy 
haste of angry nervousness. 

“Ah, shucks!” he cried out, pushing away the 
easel with a kick.... I can do nothing but botch- 
work today!.... The devil take me, one might think 
I was competing for a prize.” 

Moving back his chair he examined his sketch with 
a frigid air and muttered: 

“Whenever women come here it’s the same old 


story..... When they go away the women leave you 
the soul of a Boulanger in the pretty claws of a 
Henner.... Henner, do you understand?.. Let’s go 
out.” 


When we were at the end of the street: 

“Are you coming to dine with me, Lirat?” I 
asked him. 

“No,” he replied in a dry tone, reaching out his 
hand. 

And he walked away, stiff, formal, solemn, with the 
business air of a deputy who has just discussed the 
budget. 


96 CALVARY 


That evening I did not go out and remained at 
home to muse in solitude. Stretched on a sofa, with 
half-closed eyes, and body made torpid by the heat, 
almost slumbering, I liked to go back to my past, to 
bring to life things dead and to recall memories which 
escaped me. Five years had passed since the war — 
the war in which I began my apprenticeship in life by 
entering the tormenting profession of a man-killer.... 
Five years already!... Still it seemed like yesterday 
... the smoke, the fields covered with snow, stained 
with blood and ruins, these fields where, like ghosts, we 
wandered about piteously, worn out with fatigue.... 
Only five years!... And when I came back to the 
Priory, the house was empty, my father dead!... My 
letters had come to him only rarely, at long intervals 
and they had always been short, dry, written in haste 
on the back of my knapsack. Only once, after a night 
of terrible anguish had I become tender, affectionate; 
only once had I poured out my heart to him, and this 
letter which should have brought him sweetness, hope 
and consolation he had not received!... Every morn- 
ing, Marie told me, he used to come out to the gate 
an hour before the arrival of the mailman and watch 
the turn of the road, a prey to mortal fear. Old wood 
cutters would pass on their way to the woods; my 
father used to question them: 

“Hey there, uncle Ribot, you have not seen the 
mailman, by any chance?” 

“Why no, Monsieur Mintié — it’s a little early yet.” 

“ Oh, no, uncle Ribot, he is rather late.” 

“That might be, Monsieur Mintié, that might be.” 

When he noticed the kepi and red collar of the mail- 
man he became pale, trembling with the fear of bad 
news. As the mailman approached, the heart of my 
father beat furiously, almost bursting. 

“Nothing but magazines today, Monsieur Mintié.” 


CALVARY 97 


“ How is that! ... No letters at all! You must be 
mistaken, my boy. Look. . . look again. .. .” 

He made the mailman search in his letter bag, 
untie the bundles and go through them again.... 

“Nothing!... Why it’s impossible! 

And he would return to the kitchen, seat himself in | 
the rocking chair heaving a sigh: 

“ Just think of it,” he would say to Marie who gave 
him a bowl of milk, “just think of it, Marie, if his poor 
mother had been alive!” 

During the day, when in town, he used to visit peo- 
ple who had sons in the army; the conversation was 
always the same. 

“Well, have you heard from your boys.” 

“Why, no, M’sieur Mintié. .How about you, have 
you heard anything from Jean?” 

“T haven’t either.” 

“That’s very strange. How is it possible?... Can 
you explain it? ...” 

That they themselves did not get any letters only 
half surprised them, but that Mintié, the mayor, had 
not received any either, surprised them very much. 
Most unusual conjectures were made; they turned to 
the confusing statements of the papers, they ques- 
tioned old soldiers who told them their war experi- 
ences with the most extravagant and lavish details; 
at the end of a couple of hours, they would part with 
lighter hearts. 

“ Don’t worry M’sieur Mayor. You’ll see him back 
a colonel, sure.’ 

“Colonel, colonel!” my father would say, shaking 
his head. “IT don’t ask that much... Just so he 
comes back! EP 4 : 

One day—nobody knew how that happened—Saint- 
Michel found itself full of Prussian soldiers. The 
Priory was occupied. Long sabres were found in our 


98 CALVARY 


old house. From this moment, my father became 
more ill than ever, he took fever and was confined to 
his bed, and in his delirium he repeated without end: 
“Put the horses to, Felix, put the horses to, for I 
want to go to Alengon to get some news of Jean!” 
He imagined himself starting out on the road. “ Gid 
up, gid up, Bichette, gid up, come on!... We are 
going to have some news of Jean this evening.... 
Gid up, gid up, come on!.. And my poor father 
gently breathed his last in the arms of the curé 
Blanchetiére, surrounded by Felix and Marie who 
were sobbing!... After a six months’ stay at the 
Priory, now sadder than ever, I was weary to death... 
Old Marie, accustomed to manage the house according 
to her own notions, was unbearable to me; in spite of 
her devotion, her whims exasperated me, and there 
always were long altercations in which I never had 
the last word. For my only company I had the good 
curé to whom nothing appealed as much as the pro- 
fession of a notary. From morning till night he used 
to lecture to me thus: 

“Your grandfather was a notary, so was your 
father, your uncles, your cousins, in fact your whole 
family. ... You owe it to yourself, my dear child, 
not to desert your post. You shall be Mayor of Saint- 
Michel, you may even hope to replace your poor 
father at the general council, in a few years.... Why 
man alive, that’s something! And then—take my 
word for it—times are going to be pretty hard for 
decent people who love the good Lord.... You see 
that rascal Lebecq, he is municipal counsellor. All he 
thinks of is how to rob and kill people, that brigand 
there.... We need at the head of our country a 
right-minded man to uphold religion and defend the 
principles of righteousness.... Paris, Paris!... Oh! 
these silly heads, those youngsters!... But will you 


CALVARY 99 


please tell me what good you have accomplished at 
Paris?... Why, the very air there is infected! Look 
at big Mange, he comes from a good family, but that 
did not prevent him from coming back from Paris with 
a red cap on. Isn’t that a pretty affair?” 

And he would continue in this vein for hours, tak- 
ing his snuff, evoking the vision of the red cap of big 
Mange which appeared to him more abominable than 
the horns of the devil. 

What was there to do at Saint-Michel? There was 
no one to whom I could communicate my thoughts, 
my dreams; there was no outlet for the ardor of life 
where I could expend that intellectual energy, that 
passion for knowledge and for creative work which the 
war, in developing my muscles, in strengthening my 
body, had awakened in me, and which omnivorous 
reading overstimulated in me more and more every 
day. I realized that Paris alone, which formerly had 
frightened me so much, that Paris alone could furnish 
nourishment for ambitions, as yet indefinite, which 
spurred me on, and with the estate settled, and the 
library sold I left suddenly, leaving the Priory to the 
care of Felix and Marie.... And here f am back in 
Paris!... 

What have I accomplished during these five years, 
to use the words of the curé?... Carried away by 
vague ardors, by confused enthusiasm which blended 
together some sort of a chimeric ideal with a kind of 
impracticable apostleship, how far did I get?... I 
am no longer the timid child whom the footmen, in the 
vestibule flooded with light, used to put to flight. If 
I have not acquired much self-assurance, I at least 
know how to behave in society without appearing too 
ridiculous. I pass pretty much unnoticed, a condition 
which is the best that could be wished for a man of my 


100 CALVARY 


calibre who possesses none of the graces and qualities 
which are necessary to shine there. 

Very often I ask myself: what am I doing here in 
this society to which I do not belong, where they 
respect only success however fraudulently obtained, 
only money, no matter from what filthy place it 
comes; where every spoken word acts as a wound 
inflicted on everything I love best and everything I 
admire most? ... Besides, is not man with all his 
differences of education which are betrayed only in 
his gestures, in his manner of greeting, in his more or 
less graceful bearing, pretty much the same no matter 
where he is?... What! were these the high-spirited 
artists, the much admired writers whose glory is 
sung, whose genius is acclaimed... these petty, vulgar, 
frightfully pedantic beings, slavishly aping the man- 
ners of the society they rail at, ludicrously vain, 
fiercely jealous, lying prostrate before weaith, and 
kneeling in the dust, worshipping publicity — that old 
blackguard, which they carry about on velvet cush- 
ions. ... Oh, how much better I love the herdsmen 
and their oxen, the pig drivers and their pigs, yes the 
pigs, round and pink, digging the earth with their 
snouts and whose fat smooth backs reflect the clouds 
that float above! 

I read excessively, without discrimination, without 
system, and from this faulty reading there was left 
in my mind nothing but a chaos of disjointed facts and 
incomplete ideas, from the tangle of which I did not 
know how to extricate myself.... I tried to acquire 
knowledge in every way, but I realized that I was just 
as ignorant today as I had been in the past.... I had 
had mistresses whom I loved for a week, sentimental 
and romantic blondes, fierce brunettes, impatient to 
be caressed, and love showed me only the frightful 
emptiness of the human heart, the deceptiveness of 


CALVARY 101 


affection, the lie of the ideal, the nothingness of 
pleasure.... 

Believing myself converted to the formule of de- 
scriptive art by means of which I was going to harness 
my ambition and fix my shifting and thrilling dreams 
upon the pinion of words, I had published a book 
which was praised and which proved to be “a best 
seller.” Of course, I was flattered by this little suc- 
cess; I, too, spoke of myself with pride as of a rare 
talent; I, too, gave myself superior airs in order to 
deceive others all the better. And wishing to deceive 
myself as well, I often looked upon myself in the 
mirror with the complacency of a comedian, in order 
that I might discover certain marks of genius in my 
eyes, on my forehead, in the majestic bearing of my 
head. 

Alas! Success rendered yet more painful the inner 
knowledge of my impotence. My book did not amount 
to much; its style was forced, its conception infantile: 
a passionate harangue, an absurd phraseology took 
the place of ideas in it. At times I would read over 
the passages praised by the. critics, and in those 
passages discover something of everybody: Herbert 
Spencer and Scribe, Jean Jacques Rousseau and Com- 
merson, Victor Hugo, Poe and Eugene Chavette. Of 
my own contribution, I, whose name was displayed 
on the title page, on the yellow cover of the volume, 
found nothing. Following the caprices of my memo- 
ries, aroused by the intermittent light of my recollec- 
tions, I expressed the thoughts of one and used the 
style of another; none of the ideas or style belonged 
to me. And important looking persons whose tastes 
are infallible and whose judgment is law praised my 
personality, my originality, the unexpected nature and 
subtleness of my impressions!... 

How sad it was!... Whither was I going? I knew 


102 CALVARY 


no more about it today than I did yesterday. I had 
the conviction that I could not be a writer, because all 
the effort of which I was capable had been spent in 
writing that miserable and incoherent book. Had I 
had a more humble and compromising ambition, 
were I only prompted by desires less noble, by those 
which never cause remorse — such as love of money, 


official titles, dissoluteness!... But, no! Only one 
thing which I could never attain lured me, and that 
was talent... To be able to say to myself, yes... to 


say to myself: “This book, this sonnet, this phrase 
is yours, you wrung it from your brains swollen with 
passion; it is your thought that quivers here; it is 
pieces of your flesh and drops of your blood, that it 
scatters over the sorrowful pages; it is your nerves 
that vibrate in it like the strings of a violin under the 
bow of a divine musician. What you have accom- 
plished here is beautiful and grand!” For this moment 
of supreme joy I would be willing to sacrifice my 
future, my wealth, my life; I would be willing even 
to kill!... 

And never, never will I be able to say that to my- 
self!... Ah how I envied the eternal self-content- 
ment of the mediocre!... Now I again felt a passion- 
ate desire to return to Saint-Michel. I wished I 
could drive the plough in the brown furrow, roll in the 
fields of yellow clover, smell the wholesome odor of the 
stables, and, above all, lose myself in the thick of the 
coppice wood, penetrating into it farther and 
farther. ... 

The light went out and my lamp was smoking. A 
cold like a gentle caress filled my legs and sent 
a current of pleasurable chills through my back. Out- 
side not a sound was heard; the street grew silent. 
It had been long since I heard the dull trundle of the 
omnibus rolling on the causeway. The clock struck 


CALVARY 103 


six. But a sort of laziness kept me glued to my sofa: 
while thus stretched out I felt a physical pleasure 
amidst a great mental depression. I had to make a 
strenuous effort to free myself from this languor and 
to go into my bedroom. I found it impossible to fall 
asleep. No sooner did I close my eyes than it seemed 
to me that I had been thrown into a black and very 
deep pit, and suddenly I awoke, panting and perspir- 
ing. I again lit my lamp, tried to read.... I could 
not concentrate my mind on the lines of the text which 
seemed to swerve, to cross one another, to abandon 
themselves to a fantastic dance under my very eyes. 
What a stupid life mine is!... Why am I so dif- 
ferent, preyed upon by obnoxious chimeras? Who 
has poured into my soul this deadly poison of weari- 
ness and discouragement? Before others there stretches 
a vast horizon illumined by the sun! But I am walk- 
ing in the darkness, stopped on every side by walls 
which obstruct my way and against which I vainly 
beat my head and knees... . Perhaps it is because they 
possess love! Love, ah yes! If I could only love! 
And again I saw the beautiful virgin of Saint-Mi- 
chel, the radiant virgin of plaster of paris with its 
robe adorned with stars and its golden nimbus de- 
scending from heaven. All around her suns were re- 
volving, inclining themselves like celestial flowers, and 
doves in the exaltation of prayers were flying about, 
brushing her with their wings.... I recalled the 
ecstasies, the fits of mystic adoration which she evoked 
in me; all the sweet joys which I had experienced 
came back to me at the mere contemplation of her. 
Did she not also speak to me, then, at the chapel? 
And those unuttered words which poured into my 
childish soul such ineffable tenderness, this language 
more harmonious than angels’ voices and the music 
of golden harps, this language more fragrant than the 


104 CALVARY 


perfume of roses,— was it not the divine language of 
love? 

As I listened with all my senses to this language 
which was music to me, I was lifted into a world un- 
known and wondrous; a new enchanted life sprouted, 
burst into bud and flourished all around me. The 
horizon receded into mysterious infinity: space shone 
bright like the interior of the sun, and I felt myself 
growing so tall and strong that in one embrace I 
was pressing to my breast all the beings, all the 
flowers, all the swarms of creatures born of the glance 
of love exchanged between the Holy Virgin of plaster 
and a little child. 

“Holy Virgin, kindly Virgin!” I cried. “ Speak to 
me, speak to me again,— as you used to in the past, 
in the chapel.... And give me love once more, for 
love is life and I am dying because I am no longer 
able to love.” 

But the Virgin was not listening to me any longer. 
She glided into the chamber and curtsying, mounted 
the chairs, pried into the furniture pieces, singing 
strange airs all the time. A drawn bonnet of otter 
skin now replaced her nimbus of gold, her eyes became 
like those of Juliette Roux, very large, very sweet, 
which smiled at me from a plaster face under a veil 
of very fine gauze. From time to time she approached 
my bed, waving above me her embroidered handker- 
chief which exhaled a violent perfume. 

“ Monsieur Mintié,” she said, “I am at home every 
day from five to seven. And I shall be delighted to 
see you, delighted!” 

“Virgin, kindly Virgin!” I implored again. “ Speak 
to me, please. Speak to me as you did formerly in the 
chapel.” 

“Tu, tu, tu, tu!” hummed the Virgin who, causing 
her lilac robe to swell out and removing her cloak, 


CALVARY 105 


adorned with golden stars with the tips of her long, 
thin fingers, began to turn around slowly as if dancing 
a waltz, her head swaying from one side to the other. 

“Good Virgin!” I repeated in a rather irritated 
voice, “ why don’t you speak to me!” 

She stopped, posted herself in front of me, stripped 
off her plaster garments one after another, and entirely 
nude, lustful and magnificent, her bosom shook with 
clear, sonorous, precipitous laughter: 

“ Monsieur Mintié,” she said, “I am at home every 
day from five to seven. And I’ll give you Charles’ old 
trousers.” And she threw her otter skin bonnet at me. 

I sat up on my bed.... With a stupid gaze and 
breathing with difficulty, I looked about me. But the 
room was quiet, the lamp continued to burn sadly and 
my open book was lying on the carpet. 

The next morning I got up late, having slept badly, 
pursued by the thought of Juliette in my sleep dis- 
turbed by nightmares. During the remainder of that 
troubled, feverish night she did not leave me for an 
instant, assuming the most extravagant forms, 
abandoning herself to the most wretched pranks, and 
lo! I again beheld her in the morning, and this time 
she was the same as when I met her before at Lirat’s, 
with her air of modesty, her discreet and charming 
manners. 

I felt a kind of sadness — not exactly sadness, but 
regret, the regret one feels at the sight of a rose-bush 
whose roses have wilted and whose petals are scat- 
tered over the muddy ground. For I could not think 
of Juliette without thinking at the same time of Lirat’s 
malignant words: “ There was also an affair with a 
wrestler of Neuilly whom she gave twenty francs.” 
What a pity! ... When she entered the studio I 
could swear that she was the most virtuous of 
women.... Her very manner of walking, greeting, 


106 CALVARY 


smiling, seating herself bespoke good breeding, a 
peaceful, happy life without hasty acts of indiscretion, 
without degrading remorse. Her hat, her cloak, her 
dress, her whole appearance) was of a refined and 
charming elegance, meant for the enjoyment of just 
one, for the cheerfulness of a secluded house, closed 
to the seekers of unclean spoils.... And her eyes, 
radiating a perfectly legitimate tenderness, her eyes 
from which shone such candor, so much sincerity, 
which seemed to have no knowledge of lies, her eyes 
more beautiful than the lakes haunted by the moon!... 

“Is Charles all right?” Lirat had asked. 

Charles? ... Her husband, to be sure! ... And 
naively I pictured to myself a respectable interior of 
a room, with jolly children playing on the carpet, a 
family lamp, grouping kind and simple beings around 
its gentle shimmer; a chaste bed, protected by a cru- 
cifix and a hallowed branch of boxtree!... Then sud- 
denly, crashing into this peace, the bullhead 
from the Bouffes, the croupier of the gambling club, 
and Charles Malterre who broke Lirat’s lounge by 
rolling on it, while crying in rage! ... I conjured 
the image of the comedian —a pallid face, wrinkled, 
glabrous, with impudent bloodshot eyes, with sensual 
lips, wearing an open collar, a pink cravat, a low- 
plaited short jacket! 

I was unnerved and irritated.... What did it 
matter to me, after all? Did the life of this woman 
concern me, was it related to me in any way?... 
Was it my business to interest myself in the fate of 
women whom chance threw in my path? ... I don’t 
care what she is, this Mlle. Juliette Roux! ... She is 
neither my sister nor my fiancée, nor my friend; there 
is not a single bond of kinship between us. ... If I 
had seen her yesterday walking on the street, like one 
of the thousands of persons whom one brushes against 


CALVARY 107 


every day and who pass on and vanish, she would 
have already been drawn into the vortex of oblivion 
and never again would I be likely to see her. 

“Maybe Lirat is mistaken?” I repeated, while 
breakfasting. I knew his exaggerations, his passion 
for ridicule, his horror of and contempt for woman. 
What he said of Juliette he was saying of all other 
women. Who knows,— perhaps this comedian, this 
croupier, all the details of this ignominious affair in 
the exposure of which his spiteful spirit found grati- 
fication, existed only in his imagination? And Charles 
Malterre? 

Undoubtedly I should have preferred to see her 
married. I should have been pleased to see her lean- 
ing openly on the arm of a man, respected, envied by 
the most honest! But she loved this Malterre, she 
lived decently with him, she was devoted to him: 
“ Charles will be sorry to learn of your refusal.” The 
almost entreating voice in which she said those words 
was still in my ears. This means that she was mind- 
ful of the things that might or might not please Mal- 
terre. 

And at the thought that Lirat, in making improper 
use of a false situation, was calumniating her in an 
odious manner, my heart grew heavy, a feeling of 
great pity swept over me and I caught myself saying 
aloud: “Poor girl!” Still this Malterre had been 
writhing on the lounge, he had cried, he had laid bare 
his heart to Lirat, had shown him her letters. Well, 
what of it? What have I to do with this woman? 
Let her have all the singers, all the croupiers, all the 
wrestlers she wants! To hell with her! And I went 
out humming a gay air, with the free bearing of a 
gentleman whose spirit is not in the least troubled by 
anything. And why should it be, I ask you?... 

I went down the boulevards, stopping in front of 


108 CALVARY 


the booths, strolling in spite of the sun, which was 
like a niggardly and pallid smile of December still 
permeated with fog; the air was cold and piercing. 
On the sidewalk women were passing, shivering with 
cold, wrapped in long cloaks of otter skin, some of 
them dressed in small drawn bonnets of fur like Juli- 
ette’s, and every time these cloaks and bonnets at- 
tracted my attention I observed them with genuine 
pleasure. I liked to follow them with my glance until 
they were lost in the crowd. At the corner of the Rue 
Taitbout, I remember, I came upon a tall slender 
woman, pretty and resembling Juliette so closely that 
I brought my hand to my hat ready to greet her. I 
was excited —oh, it was not the violent beating of 
the heart which halts your breathing, weakens the 
flow of blood in your veins and stuns you; it was a 
light touch, a caress, something very sweet, which 
brings a smile upon the lips and a cheerful surprise to 
the eyes. 

But this woman was not Juliette. I felt somewhat 
peeved and avenged myself by thinking her very ugly. 
Two o’clock already! ... Shall I go to see Lirat? 
Why? To make him talk about Juliette, to compel 
him to admit that he had lied to me, to make him tell 
me of her traits of character, sublime and poignant, 
tell me some touching stories of her devotion, sacrifice 
— that tempted me. I thought the matter over, how- 
ever, knowing that Lirat would be angry, that he 
would mock at me, at her, and I had a horror of his 
sarcasms; I already heard sinister words, abominable 
phrases coming out of a twisted corner of his mouth 
with a hissing sound. 

At the Champs-Elysées, I called a hackney-coach 
and proceeded toward the Bois. Why dissemble? 
There I hoped to meet Juliette. Yes, certainly I 
hoped it, but at the same time I feared it. Not to see 


CALVARY 109 


her at all, I felt, would prove a disappointment to me. 
On the other hand, were she in the habit of exhibiting 
herself in this market place of gallantry regularly like 
the other ladies, I should again feel hurt, and in the 
end I did not know what it was that stirred me more: 
the hope of seeing her or the fear of meeting her. 

There were few people in the Bois. On the grand 
lake drive, carriages were passing slowly at a consid- 
erable distance from one another, the drivers perched 
high upon their seats. Sometimes a brougham would 
leave the strung-out line, turn and disappear to the 
trot of its horses, carrying away God knows where the 
profile of a woman, or some white and pallid faces, or 
the end of a ruffled dress seen for a moment through 
the window of the coach door. ... My heart and the 
blood in my temples were beating faster, impatience 
caused the tips of my fingers to twitch; my neck was 
tired from turning in the same direction in an effort 
to penetrate the shadow of the carriages and began to 
hurt; anxiously I was chewing the end of a cigar 
which I could not make up my mind to light, for fear 
of missing her carriage in the act. Once I thought I 
saw her inside a brougham, which was going in the 
opposite direction. 

“Turn, turn,” I shouted to the driver, “and follow 
that brougham.” 

I did not at all reflect whether or not I was acting 
properly towards a woman to whom I had been intro- 
duced only the day before, and casually at that, one 
whose reputation I wanted to see rehabilitated at all 
costs. Half leaning against the lowered window of 
the coach door, I never lost sight of the brougham. 
And I was saying to myself: “ Perhaps she recognized 
me! Perhaps she is going to stop, get out of the car- 
riage, appear in the street.” Indeed, I was saying this 
to myself without the slightest notion of attempting 


110 CALVARY 


a gallant conquest. I was saying that as if it were 
the simplest and most natural thing in the world. The 
brougham rolled on speedily, lightly, bounding on its 
springs, and my hackney coach followed it with diffi- 
culty. 

“ Faster!” I gave the order, “faster, and get ahead 
of it!” 

The driver lashed his horse, which started into a 
gallop, and in a few seconds the wheels of the two car- 
riages touched each other. Then a woman’s head, 
with dishevelled hair under a very large hat, with a 
nose comically turned up, with lips cracked from the 
excessive use of paint and crimson like a living flesh 
wound, appeared in the frame of the coach door. With 
a scornful glance, she took in the driver, the cab, the 
horse and myself, put out her tongue and then with- 
drew into a corner of her carriage. It was not Juli- 
ette! I did not come home until night, very much 
disappointed and yet delighted with my useless drive! 

I had no plans for the evening. Still I spent more 
than the usual time in dressing myself. I did it with 
the greatest care, and, for the first time, the knot of 
my cravat seemed to me a matter of great importance, 
and I was very much absorbed in the process of tying 
it carefully. This unexpected discovery brought in its 
train others equally important. For example, I no- 
ticed that my shirt was ill cut, that the shirt front 
wrinkled disgracefully at the opening of the vest; that 
my dress coat looked very old and curiously out of 
style. In a word, I thought I looked very ridiculous 
and promised myself to change all that in the future. 
Without making elegant appearance an exacting and 
tyrannical law of my life, it was quite permissible, I 
thought, to look like the rest of the people. Simply 
because one dressed well, one was not necessarily a 
fool. 


CALVARY 111 


These preoccupations consumed my time till the 
dinner hour. Usually I ate at home, but this evening 
my apartment appeared to me so small, so dismal; it 
suffocated me, and I felt the need of space, of noise, 
of merriment. 

At the restaurant I took an interest in everything: 
the coming and going of people, the gilding on the 
ceiling, the large mirrors which multiplied to infinity 
the parlors, waiters, electric globes, the flowers on 
ladies hats, the counters on which were spread dressed 
meats of all kinds, where pyramids of fruit, red and 
gold colored, rose amid salads and sparkling glass- 
ware. I watched the women above all, I studied their 
somewhat airy manner of eating, the joy in their eyes, 
the movement of their ungloved arms encircled by 
heavy bracelets of glittering gold, the exposed lines 
of their necks so delicate and tender, which gradually 
receded into the bosom, under the roseate lace nap- 
kin. This fascinated me, it affected me like something 
altogether new, like a landscape of some distant coun- 
try suddenly glimpsed. I was wonder-struck, like a 
boy. 

Ordinarily, impelled by the brooding disposition of 
my nature, I would fasten my attention on the inti- 
mate moral life of a human being, that is to say, I 
would point out its ugliness or suffering; at this mo- 
ment, on the contrary, I abandoned myself to the joy 
of solely perceiving its physical charm: I was de- 
lighted to observe the magic spell cast by the women; 
even in the ugliest one I found some little detail such 
as a curve in the back of a neck, a languor in eyes, 
a suppleness of hands — always something or other — 
which made me happy, and I reproached myself for 
having until now arranged my life so badly, for having 
isolated myself like a barbarian in a dark melancholy 
chamber, for not having lived, while all this time Paris 


112 CALVARY 


was offering me, at every step, joys so easily attained 
and so sweet to relish. 

. “Ts Monsieur perhaps waiting for someone?” the 
waiter asked me. 

Some one? Why no, I was not waiting for anyone. 
The door of the restaurant opened and I quickly 
turned around. Then I understood why the waiter 
had asked that question. Each time the door opened 
I would hastily turn around as I did just now and 
would stare anxiously at the people entering as if I 
knew that someone was about to enter, someone I 
was waiting for.... Some one! Well, for whom 
could I be waiting? 

I very seldom went to the theatre; to force me there, 
a special occasion or obligation or inducement was 
required. I quite believe that of my own accord I 
would never think of going there. I even affected a 
supreme contempt for the kind of literary stuff offered 
for sale in these pushcart markets of mediocrity. Con- 
ceiving, as I did, the theatre as a place not of idle 
distraction but of serious art, it was repugnant to me 
to see human passion warbling one and the same sen- 
timental tune amidst the mechanism of always ident- 
ical scenes, to see gaiety, bedecked with tinsel, tum- 
bling into the same pit of tomfoolery. A manufac- 
turer of such plays, be they ever so applauded, seemed 
to me an artist gone astray; he bore the same relation 
to the poet that an unfrocked clergyman bears to a 
priest, or a deserter does to a soldier! 

And I always remembered Lirat’s remark, so pow- 
erfully concise, so profoundly discerning. We had 
been attending the funeral of the painter M 
The celebrated dramatist D was the chief 
mourner. At the cemetery he delivered an address. 
This did not surprise anyone, for did not H and 
D enjoy a reputation of equal greatness? At 














CALVARY 113 


the end of the ceremony Lirat took my arm and we 
walked back to Paris very sad. Lirat, who seemed 
lost in painful meditation, was silent. Suddenly he 
stopped, crossed his arms and, swaying his head with 
an irresistibly comical air because it was intended to 
be grave, exclaimed: “But why did that fellow 
D interfere, tell me?” And he was right. Why 
did he interfere, really? Did they come from the 
same stock and were they headed for the same glory — 
the one an ardent artist with grandiose thoughts and 
immortal works, and the other, whose sole ideal was 
to entertain with silly nonsense an assembly of 
wealthy and reputable bourgeois each evening. Yes, 
really, why did he interfere? 

How removed I was from such morose sentiments 
when, after dinner, having sauntered along the boule- 
vards, enjoying the feeling of physical well-béing 
which gave to my movement a special lightness and 
elasticity, I seated myself in a chair at the Varieté, 
where a successful musical comedy was being played! 
With my face deliciously freshened by the cold air 
outside, my heart entirely won over to a sort of uni- 
versal forebearance, I was really enjoying myself. 
With what? I did not know and little cared to know, 
not being in the mood for psychological self-analysis. 

As was proper, I arrived during the intermission, 
when the crowd, very elegant in appearance, was fill- 
ing the lobbies. After having left my overcoat at the 
check room, I passed through the parterre boxes with 
that same sweet impatience, that same delicious an- 
guish, which I had already experienced at the Bois; 
on reaching the first balcony I continued the same 
careful inspection of the loges. “ Why is she not 
here?” I asked myself. Each time I failed to dis- 
tinguish clearly a woman’s face, whether it was be- 
cause the face was slightly bent, in shadow, or cut 





114 CALVARY 


off from view by a fan, I would say to myself: “ That’s 
Juliette!” And each time it was not Juliette at all. 
The play amused me; I laughed heartily at the flat 
jokes which constituted the essence of the piece: I 
enjoyed all this perverse ineptitude, this vulgar coarse- 
ness and really found in it a quality of irony which 
did not lack literary merit. At the love scenes I grew 
sentimental. During the last intermission I met a 
young man whom I scarcely knew. Glad of the op- 
portunity to pour out the banalities which had accu- 
mulated in me and were pressing for an outlet, I 
clung to him. 

“An amazing thing, isn’t it?” he said to me. “It 
is stunning, eh?” 

“Yes, it isn’t bad!” 

“Not bad! Not bad! ... Why that is a master- 
piece, an astounding masterpiece! What I especially 
like is the second act. There is a situation for you, 
not that . . . a tense situation! Why it is high com- 
edy, you know! And the gowns! And that Judic, 
ah! that Judic! ...” 

He struck his thigh and clicked his tongue: 

“Tt got me all excited, my dear! It’s astonishing!” 

We thus discussed the merits of the various acts, 
scenes and actors. 

When we were parting: 

“Tell me,” I asked him, “do you happen to know 
a certain Juliette Roux?” 

“Wait now! Oh, perfectly well! A little brunette, 
very ‘chic’? No, I got mixed up. Wait now! Juli- 
ette Roux! Don’t know her.” 

An hour later I was seated at a table with a glass of 
soda water in front of me, in the café de la Paix where, 
after the theatre, used to assemble the most beautiful 
representatives of the fashionable world. A great many 
women came in and out, insolent, loud-mouthed, their 


CALVARY 115 


faces covered with fresh layers of rice powder, their 
lips newly painted with rouge! At the adjoining table 
a little blond lady, already aged but very animated, 
was speaking in a nasal voice; a brunette, farther 
away, was simpering with a turkey’s ludicrous ma- 
jesty, and with the same hand which had raked man- 
ure on the farm she held a fan, while her escort, lean- 
ing against his chair, his hat pushed back, his legs 
spread apart, was obdurately sucking his cane’s head. 

An uncontrollable feeling of disgust rose within me; 
I was ashamed of being here, and I compared the 
ridiculous and noisy manners of these women with 
the reserved deportment of the gentle Juliette at Li- 
rat’s studio. These raucous and piercing voices ren- 
dered even more suave the freshness of her voice, the 
voice which I still heard saying to me: “ Delighted, 
Monsieur! But I know you well.” I arose. 

“ What a scoundrel this Lirat is, all the same,” I 
exclaimed while getting into bed, furious at the fact 
that he had so treated a young woman whom I had 
met neither on the street, at the Bois, in the restaurant, 
at the theatre, nor at the night cabaret. 


CHAPTER IV 


" ADAME JULIETTE ROUX, if you please?” 
“Will Monsieur please come in?” the 


maid asked. 

Without demanding my name or waiting for my 
answer, she made me cross a small, dark antechamber, 
and led me into a room where at first I could only 
distinguish a lamp covered by a large lamp-shade, 
which burned low in a corner. The maid raised the 
flame of the lamp and carried out an otter skin cape 
which had been thrown on the sofa. 

“T will go tell madame,” she said. 

And she disappeared, leaving me alone in the room. 

So I was at her house! For eight days the thought 
of this visit had tortured me. I had no special busi- 
ness, I simply wanted to see Juliette; some kind of 
keen curiosity, which I did not stop to analyze, drew 
me to her. Several times I had gone to the Rue Saint 
Petersbourg with the firm intention of calling on her, 
but at the last moment my nerve failed me, and I left 
without mustering sufficient courage to cross her 
threshold. And now I was the most embarrassed be- 
ing in the world, and I regretted my foolish step, for 
obviously it was a foolish step. How would she re- 
ceive me? What should I say? What caused me 
the greatest uneasiness was that after I had made a 
thorough search in my brain I found not a single 
phrase, not a single word with which to begin our 
conversation when Juliette entered. What if words 
should fail me and I should be left standing here with 
gaping mouth! How ridiculous that would be! 

I examined the room into which Juliette was pres- 


CALVARY 117 


ently to come. It was a dressing room which also 
served as a parlor. It made a rather unfavorable im- 
pression on me. The toilet table, ostentatiously dis- 
played with its two wash basins of cracked, pink cut 
glass, shocked me. The walls and ceiling, hung with 
loud red satin, the furniture, bordered with elaborate 
plush hangings, the knick-knacks, costly and ugly, 
placed here and there on the furniture, the queer 
tables serving no apparent purpose, consols weighed 
down with heavy ornaments —all this bespoke a vul- 
gar taste. I noticed in the center of the mantlepiece, 
between two massive vases of onyx, a terra-cotta 
statuette of Cupid, smiling with a sort of grimace and 
offering a flower held at the tips of his outspread fin- 
gers. Every detail revealed, on the one hand, a love 
of expensive and unrefined luxury, and on the other 
a regrettable predilection for romance and puerile 
affection. It was at once distressing and sentimental. 
Nevertheless, and that was a relief to me, I saw here 
no evidence of that incongruity, that transitory air, 
that severity of aspect so characteristic off ladies’ 
boarding houses, those apartments where one is made 
aware of a haggard existence, where by the number of 
knick-knacks one can count the number of lovers who 
have passed there, lovers for an hour, a night, a year; 
where every chair tells of the lack of decency, the 
unfaithfulness; where on the glass one can see the 
tragedy of fortune’s fickleness; on the marble, traces 
of a tear still warm; on the candlestick, blood drops 
still moist. The door opened and Juliette appeared 
wearing a white, long flowing dress. I trembled, color 
came to my face; but she recognized me and, smiling 
that smile of hers which at last I found again, she 
stretched out her hand. 

“Ah! Monsieur Mintié!” she said, “how nice of 


118 CALVARY 


you not to have forgotten me! Has it been long since 
you saw that eccentric Lirat?” 

“ Why, yes, Madame, I have not seen him since the 
day I had the honor of meeting you at his place.” 

“Ah, my God, I though you two never separated 
at all.” 

“Tt is true,” I replied, “that I see him quite often. 
But I have been working all these days.” 

As I thought I detected a note of irony in the sound 
of her voice, I added, to provoke her: 

“ What a great artist, isn’t he?” 

Juliette let this remark pass unanswered. 

“So you are always working?” She took up the 
subject again. “‘ For the rest, I am told you live like 
a regular recluse. Really, one sees very little of you, 
Monsieur Mintié!” 

The conversation took a quite ordinary turn, the 
theatre furnishing food for nearly all of it. A remark 
which I made seemed to astound her, and she was 
rather scandalized. 

“What, you don’t like the theatre? Is it possible 
—and you an artist? I am passionately fond of it. 
The theatre is so amusing! We are going to the 
Varieté tonight, for the fourth time, mind you.” 

A feeble yelp came from behind the door. 

“Ah, my God!” Juliette exclaimed, hurriedly ris- 
ing. “My Spy whom I left in my room! Shall I 
present Spy to you, Monsieur Mintié? Don’t you 
- know Spy?” 

She opened the door, drew aside the hangings, 
which were very wide. 

“Come, Spy!” she said coaxingly. ‘“ Where have 
you been, Spy? Come over here, poor thing!” 

And I saw a diminutive little animal, with a pointed 
snout, long ears, advancing, dancing on its thin paws 
that resembled a spider’s legs and whose whole body, 


CALVARY 119 


bent and skinny, quivered as though in fever. A rib- 
bon of red silk, carefully tied on the side, encircled its 
neck in place of a collar. 

“Come on, Spy. Say hello to Monsieur Mintié!” 

Spy turned on me his round, stupid and cruel eyes 
which were on a level with his head, and barked vi- 
ciously. 

“ That’s right, Spy. Now give your paw. Will you 
give me your paw? Come, now!” 

Juliette bent down and threatened the dog with her 
finger. Spy finally put his paw in his mistress’ hand. 
She picked him up, patted and embraced him. 

“Oh! the dear little dog! Oh, darling dog! Oh, 
my love, my dearest Spy!” 

She sat up again, still holding the dog in her arms 
like a child, rubbing her cheek against the snout of 
the frightful beast, whispering caressing and endear- 
ing words into his ears. 

“ Now show us that you are pleased, Spy! Show 
it to your little mammy!” 

Spy barked again, then licked the lips of Juliette 
who joyously abandoned herself to these odious ca- 
resses. 

“Ah, what a dear you are, Spy! Ah, how very, 
very nice you are!” 

And addressing herself to me, whom she seemed to 
have forgotten completely since Spy’s unfortunate en- 
try, she suddenly asked: 

“Do you like dogs, Monsieur Mintié?” 

“Very much, Madame,” I answered. 

Then she told me, with a wealth of childish detail, 
the history of Spy, his habits, his urgent needs, his 
tricks, the scraps with the housekeeper who could not 
stand him. 

“ But you ought to see him when he is asleep,” she 
said to me. “ You know he has a bed, sheets, an 


120 CALVARY 


eiderdown coverlet, like a real person. Every night I 
put him to bed. And his little head looks so funny 
on it, all black. Aren’t you very funny, Monsieur 
Spy? ”? . 

Spy chose a comfortable place on Juliette’s dress, 
and, after turning several times, rolled himself into a 
black lump, almost entirely lost in the cloth’s silken 
folds. . 

“That’s it! By-by, Spy, my little baby!” 

During this long conversation with Spy, I had a 
chance to observe Juliette at leisure. She was indeed 
very beautiful, even more beautiful than I had dreamed 
she was under her veil. Her face was truly radiant. 
It had such freshness, such an aurora-like clearness, 
that the very air about her seemed illumined. When- 
ever she turned or bent forward I saw her thick hair, 
very dark, descending along her dress in an enormous 
tress, which added something peculiarly virginal and 
youthful to her appearance. I thought I saw a per- 
pendicular, wilful wrinkle furrowed in the middle of 
her forehead, at the root of her hair, but it was visible 
only in certain instances of light reflection, and the 
luminous sweetness of her eyes, the extremely grace- 
ful curve of her mouth tempered its rigid aspect. One 
felt that under her ample garments quivered a supple, 
nervous body of passionate pliancy; what delighted 
me most were her hands, delicate, deft and of surpris- 
ing agility, whose every movement, even of indiffer- 
ence or anger, was a caress. 

It was hard for me to form a definite opinion of her. 
There was in this woman a mixture of innocence and 
voluptuousness, of shrewdness and stupidity, of kind- 
ness and malevolence, which was disconcerting. And 
a curious thing! At one moment I saw the horrible 
image of the singer at the Bouffes taking shape near 
her. And this image formed Juliette’s shadow, so to 


CALVARY 121 


speak. Far from vanishing, this image, as I looked at 
it, was assuming in some way a fixed corporeal form. 
It grimaced, wriggled, leaped with lurid contortions, 
its foul, obscene lips distended toward Juliette, who 
seemed to draw the image toward herself and whose 
hand sank in its hair and passed tremblingly along its 
body, happy to sully herself with its impure con- 
tact. And the sordid juggler was removing Juliette’s 
clothes and showing her to me in a swoon, in the 
‘wretched splendor of sin! I had to shut my eyes and 
make a painful effort to dispel this abominable image, 
and Juliette immediately assumed her expression of 
enigmatic, candid tenderness. 

“ And above all, come to see me, often, very often,” 
she said, seeing me to the door, while Spy, who had 
followed her into the antechamber, barked and 
danced on his thin, spider legs. 

Outside, I felt the return of a sudden and passionate 
affection for Lirat and, reproaching myself for being 
sulky with him, I resolved to ask him to dine with me 
that very evening. On my way from the Rue Saint 
Petersbourg to the Boulevard de Courcelles where 
Lirat lived, I made some bitter reflections. The visit 
had disillusioned me, I was no longer under the spell 
of a dream and I quickly returned to desolate reality, 
to the denial of love. What I had imagined about 
Juliette was quite vague. 

My spirit, exalted by her beauty, was ascribing to 
her moral qualities and mental attainments which I 
could not define and which I assumed were extraor- 
dinary, the more so since Lirat, by attributing to her, 
without reason, a dishonorable existence and shameful 
proclivities, had made her a veritable martyr in my 
eyes, and my heart was moved. Pushing this folly 
still further, I thought that by some sort of irresistible 
sympathy she would confide her suffering to me, the - 


122 CALVARY 


grave and sorrowful secrets of her soul; I already saw 
myself consoling her, speaking to her of duty, virtue, 
resignation. I looked forward to a series of solemn 
and touching things. 

Instead of all this poesy —a frightful dog who 
barked at my feet and a woman just like others, with- 
out brains, without ideas, occupied solely with pleas- 
ures, confining her enthusiasm to the Théatre des 
Varietés and the caressing of her Spy, her Spy!... 
Ha! Ha! Ha!... Her Spy whom she loved with 
the tenderness and devotion of a porter! And on my 
way I kicked the air, at an imaginary Spy and, imi- 
tating Juliette’s voice, was saying: “Come, dear! 
Oh, dear little dog! Oh, my love, my dearest Spy!” 
Shall I admit it, I also had a grudge against her for 
not having said a word about my book. That no one 
spoke about it in ordinary life was almost a matter 
of indifference to me. But a compliment from her 
would have delighted me! I would have felt so happy 
to know that she had been moved by some page, pro- 
voked by another, as I hoped she had been. And in- 
stead — nothing! Not even an allusion! Yet, I re- 
member, I had cleverly furnished her with an oppor- 
tunity for such consideration. 

“ Decidedly, she is a goose!” I said to myself as I 
rapped at Lirat’s door. 

Lirat received me with open arms. 

“Ah! my little Mintié!” he exclaimed, “it’s very 
nice of you to come to dine with me. And you have 
come just in time, I tell you. We are going to have 
cabbage soup.” 

He rubbed his hands, and seemed very happy. He 
wanted to help me remove my overcoat and hat and, 
dragging me into the small room which served as his 
parlor, he repeated: 


CALVARY 123 


“ My little Mintié, I am so glad to see you. Will 
you come tomorrow to the studio?” 

“ Surely.” 

“ Well, you shall see! You shall see! First of all, 
I am going to give up painting, do you understand?” 

“Are you going into business?” 

“Listen to me! Painting is humbug, my little 
Mintié.” 

He grew animated, moved about the room briskly, 
waving his arms. 

“Giotto! Mantegna! Velasques! Rembrandt! 
Well, Rembrandt! Watteau! Delacroix! Ingres! 
Yes and then who? No, that is not true? Painting 
depicts nothing, expresses nothing, it’s all humbug! 
It’s all right for the art critics, bankers, and generals 
who have their portraits on horseback with a howitzer 
shell exploding in the foreground. But to render a 
glimpse of the sky, the shade of a flower, the ripple 
of the water, the air,— you understand? The air — 
all this impalpable and invisible nature, with a paste 
of paint colors! With a paste of paint colors?” 

Lirat shrugged his shoulders. 

“With a paste of paint colors coming out of tubes, 
with a paste of paint colors made by the dirty hands 
of chemists, with a paste of paint colors, heavy, opaque 
and which sticks to the fingers like jelly! Tell me... 
painting ... what humbug! No, but you will ad- 
mit, my little Mintié, that it is humbug! A drawing, 
an engraving, a two-tone piece .. . that’s the thing! 
That does not deceive, it’s honest .. . the amateurs 
sneer at that kind of work and don’t presume to 
bother you about it . . . it evokes no empty enthusi- 
asm in their ‘salons’! But real art, majestic art, ar- 
tistic art is there. Sculpture ... yes ... when it is 
beautiful, it shakes you.... But next to it is the 
art of drawing, drawing ... my little Mintié, with- 


124 CALVARY 


out Prussian blue, just plain drawing! Will you come 
to my studio tomorrow?” 

“ Certainly.” 

He continued to chop his phrases, fumble his words, 
excited by their very sound. 

“Tam beginning a series of etchings. You'll see! A 
nude woman, coming out of a deep shadow, carried 
upward on the wings of a beast. Scattered about, in 
unnatural positions, are parts of human corpses with 
dirty folds and swellings of decaying flesh . . . a belly 
cut open and losing its viscera, a belly of terrible out- 
line, hideous and true! A dead head, but a living 
dead head, you understand? Greedy, gluttonous, all 
lips. She is rising in front of a crowd of old men in 
tall hats, silk coats and white cravats. She is rising 
and the old men bend toward her panting, with hang- 
ing jaws, watering mouths, contracted eyes... all 
have lewd faces!” 

Stopping before me with an air of defiance, he con- 
tinued : 

“ And do you know what I am going to call it? Do 
you know? I am going to call it Love, my little 
Mintié. What do you think of it? .. .” 

“That seems to me a little bit too symbolic,” I 
ventured. 

“Symbolic!” interrupted Lirat. “ You are talking 
nonsense, my little Mintié! Symbolic! Why that’s 
life itself! Let’s go out and eat.” 

Our dinner was a very gay affair; Lirat displayed 
a charming disposition; he was full of original ideas, 
without extremes or paradoxes, on art. He had again 
found his normal self, as in the better days of his life. 
Several times I had a notion to tell him that I had 
seen Juliette. A kind of shame held me back; I had 
not the courage. 

“Work, work, my little Mintié,” he said to me, 


CALVARY 125 


when we were parting. “To create, always to create, 
to draw from one’s sinews or from one’s brains no 
matter what .. . be it only a pair of rubbers. There 
is nothing outside of that!” 

Six days later I went again to Juliette and gradu- 
ally I formed the habit of calling regularly and 
spending an hour before dinner. The disagreeable 
impression left on me at the time of my first visit had 
vanished. Little by little, without suspecting it, I 
grew so used to the red tapestry in her parlor, to the 
terra cotta statue of Cupid, to Juliette’s childish 
prating, even to Spy who had become my friend, that 
whenever I passed a day without seeing her, it seemed 
as though a great void had been created in my life. 

Not only did the things which at first had shocked 
me no longer do so, but, on the contrary, they now 
moved me, and each time Juliette talked to Spy or 
attended to him with exaggerated care, it was a posi- 
tive pleasure to me, appearing as an added proof of 
the simplicity and affectionate qualities of her heart. 
In the end I, too, began to speak this dog language. 
One evening, when Spy was sick, I grew uneasy and, 
removing the covers and quilts which covered him, I 
gently murmured: “ Baby Spy has a hurt; where does 
it hurt our little baby?” Only the image of the 
singer, rising near Juliette, somewhat disturbed the 
tranquility of our meetings, but I only had to close 
my eyes for a moment or turn away my head, and the 
image would instantly disappear. I persuaded Juli- 
ette to tell me her life. Until now she had always 
refused. 

“No! no!” she would say. 

And she would add with a smile, looking at me with 
her large, sad eyes: 

“What will we gain, my friend?” 

I insisted, I begged. 


126 CALVARY 


“Tt is your duty to reveal it to me and my duty to 
know it.” 

At last, conquered by this argument which I never 
tired of using in various and appealing forms, she 
consented. Oh, with what sadness! 

Her home was in Liverdun. Her father was a phy- 
sician and her mother, who led a frivolous life, had 
left her husband. As for Juliette, she had been placed 
in the home of the Sisters. Her father came home 
drunk every evening, and there were terrible scenes, 
for he was very ill-natured. The scandal grew to such 
proportions that the Sisters sent Juliette away, not 
wishing to keep the daughter of a wicked woman and 
a drunkard in their house. Ah, what a miserable life 
it was! Always locked up in her room and some- 
times beaten by her father for no cause whatever! 
One night, very late, the father entered Juliette’s 
room. “How shall I express it to you!” Juliette 
said blushing. “Oh, well, you understand... .” She 
jumped out of bed, shouted, opened the window. But 
the father was frightened and went away. The next 
morning Juliette left for Nancy, planning to live by 
working. It was here she had met Charles. 

While she was talking in a gentle, even voice I 
took her hand, her beautiful hand which I pressed 
with feeling, at the sad points of the story. I was 
indignant over the action of her father. And I cursed 
the mother for abandoning her child. I felt the stir- 
rings of a self-sacrificing devotion, and a vindictive 
desire to avenge her wrongs. When she had finished 
I wept with burning tears.... It was an exquisite 
hour. 

Juliette received very few people; some of Mal- 
terre’s friends, and two or three of Malterre’s feminine 
friends. One of them, Gabrielle Bernier, a tall, pretty 


CALVARY 127 


blond woman, always entered the house in the same 
fashion. 

“Good morning, Monsieur, good morning, dearie. 
Don’t trouble yourself, I'll be gone in a minute.” 

And she would sit down on the brace of the arm- 
chair, smoothing her muff with a brusque motion of 
her hand. 

“Just think of it, I have just had another scene 
with Robert. If you only knew what sort of a man 
he is! He comes to my house and says whimpering: 
‘ My dear little Gabrielle, I must leave you, my mother 
told me so this morning, she won’t give me any more 
money.’ ‘Your mother! I wish I had a chance to 
answer her. Well, you can tell your mother in my 
name, that whenever she is ready to give up her 
lovers, I’ll quit you that very day. But in the mean- 
time, she’ll have to dig into her pockets alright.’ And 
I don’t believe it’s true either —a dirty trick like that! 
I think it’s Robert who has cooked it up! We are 
going to the Ambigu tonight. Are you going?” 

“ Thank you.” 

“Well, I must be off! Don’t trouble yourself. 
Good day, Monsieur; good day, dearie.” 

Gabrielle Bernier irritated me very much. 

“Why do you receive such women?” I would say 
to Juliette. 

“ What harm is there, my friend? She amuses me.” 

Malterre’s friends, on the other hand, spoke of races 
and high life; they always had club and women stories 
to tell and never tired of discussing theatrical matters. 
It seemed to me that Juliette took an exaggerated 
pleasure in these conversations, but I excused her, 
ascribing it to excessive politeness. Jesselin, a very 
rich young man, considered a serious fellow, was the 
leader of the circle and all bowed before his evident 
superiority. “ What will Jesselin say? We must ask 


128 CALVARY 


Jesselin. Jesselin did not advise that.”” He was very 
much sought after. He had traveled widely and knew 
better than anyone else the best hotels. Having been 
in Afghanistan, he remembered one particular thing 
of the entire trip through Central Asia, namely that 
the Emir of Caboul, with whom he had had the honor of 
playing chess one day, played as fast as the French. 
“ Why that Emir certainly amazed me.” Quite ‘often 
he would also offer this information: “ You know how 
much I enjoy travel. Well, I can say this much. In 
sleeping cars, in cabins, in a Russian telega, no matter 
how or where I was, at half past seven every evening 
I was in my dress suit!” 

Malterre did not like me, friendly though he was. 
Having a quiet, timid nature, he dared not show his 
aversion for me, for fear of displeasing Juliette, but I 
could see it flaring up in his smiling look which was 
like that of a good-natured but frightened dog, and 
in his handshake I felt it clamoring for an outlet. 

I was happy only when alone with Juliette. There, 
in the red parlor, under the zgis of the terra cotta 
statuette of Cupid, we sometimes sat for hours, with- 
out uttering a word. I would look at her, she would 
droop her head, pensively playing with the trimming 
of her dress or the lacework of her waist. Often my 
eyes for some reason unknown, filled with tears, which 
rolled down my cheeks like some perfume, flooding , 
my soul with its magic liquid. And my whole being 
felt a sensation of satiety and delicious torpor. 

“Ah! Juliette! Juliette!” 

“Come, come my friend, be sensible.” 

Those were the only words of love that escaped us. 

Some time after this, Juliette gave a dinner to cele- 
brate Charles’ birthday. During the whole evening 
she appeared nervous and irritated. To Charles who 
offered a timid remark, she replied harshly and curtly, 


CALVARY 129 


in a manner which seemed foreign to her. It was two 
o’clock in the morning before the crowd left. I alone 
remained in the parlor. Near the door, Malterre stood 
with his back to me, talking to Jesselin who was put- 
ting on his overcoat in the vestibule. And I saw Juli- 
ette, her elbows resting on the piano, looking fixedly 
at me. A gleam of fierce passion flashed in her eyes, 
suddenly turned dark, almost terrible, marking them 
as with a novel flame. The wrinkle on her forehead 
deepened, her nostrils quivered; a strange expression 
of something unchaste wandered on her lips. I leaped 
toward her. My knees sought her own, my body 
cleaved to hers, my mouth pressed against her own, I 
clasped her in a furious embrace. 

She abandoned herself to me entirely and in a very 
low, choking voice: 

“Come tomorrow!” she said. 


CHAPTER V 


wish I could stop here. ... Ah, how I wish I 
could do that! At the thought that I am about 
to disclose so much ignominy, my courage fails me, I 
blush for shame, a feeling of cowardice instantly 
seizes me and agitates the pen in my hand.... And 
I sue for mercy from myself.... Alas! I must 
clamber to the top of this ascending, sorrowful Gol- 
gotha, even though my flesh be torn to bleeding 
pieces, even though my living body be broken against 
the rocks and stones! Sins like mine, which I am 
not trying to justify by hereditary defects or by the 
pernicious effects of an education so contrary to my 
nature, call for terrible atonement, and the atonement 
which I have chosen is a public confession of my life. 
I say to myself that merciful and noble hearts will 
think kindly of my self-imposed humiliation and I 
also say to myself that my example will perhaps serve 
as a lesson to others. ... Even if there were only 
one young man who, on the verge of falling, should 
happen to read these pages and feel so horrified and 
so disgusted as to be forever saved from evil, it seems 
to me that the salvation of his soul would signify the 
beginning of the redemption of my own. And then 
again, I hope, although I no longer believe in God, I 
hope that in the depth of those sanctuaries of peace 
where in the silence of soul-redeeming nights there 
rises to heaven the sad and soothing chant of those 
who pray for the dead, I hope that there, too, I may 
be granted my share of compassion and of Christian 
forgiveness. 


I WISH I did not have to continue this story. I 


CALVARY 131 


I had an income of twenty-two thousand francs; 
furthermore, I was certain that by doing literary work 
I could earn an equal sum, at least. Nothing seemed 
difficult to me, the path lay straight before me without 
a single obstacle, I had but to march on.... My 
shyness, my fears, my doubts, exhaustingly painful 
efforts, spiritual agonies oh, those things no longer 
mattered! A novel, two novels a year, a few plays 
for the theatre... . What did that amount to for a 
young man in love as I was? . . . Weren’t people talk- 
ing about X....and Z.... two hopeless and no- 
torious idiots who in a few years amassed a large for- 
tune?. . . Ideas for a novel, a comedy, a dramatic play 
came to me in droves. . . and I indicated their arrival 
by a broad and haughty gesture. . 

I saw myself already monopolizing all the libraries, 
all the theatres, all the magazines, the attention of the 
whole world.... In the hours when inspiration 
should prove slow and painful, all I would need to do 
would be to look at Juliette and masterpieces would 
come forth from her eyes as in a fairy-tale. I did not 
hesitate to demand Malterre’s departure and complete 
charge of Juliette’s affairs. Malterre wrote heart- 
rending letters, begged, threatened and finally de- 
parted. Later on Jesselin, displaying his usual vaunted 
tact, told us that Malterre, grief-stricken, had taken 
a trip to Italy. 

“I accompanied him as far as Marseilles,” he told 
us. “ He wanted to kill himself and was crying all 
the time. You know I am not a gullible sort of a 
chap. . . but he actually made me feel sorry for him. 
Now really!” 

And he added: 

“You know. He was ready to fight you.... It 
was his friend, Monsieur Lirat, who kept him from 


132 CALVARY 


doing that. . . . I, too, dissuaded him from it because 
I believe only in a duel to death.” 

Juliette listened to all these details silently and with 
apparent indifference. From time to time she drew 
her tongue across her lips, and in her eyes there was 
something resembling a reflection of inner joy. Was 
she thinking of Malterre? Was she happy to learn 
that someone was suffering on account of her? Alas! 
I was no longer in a position to ask myself such ques- 
tions. 

A new life began. 

I did not like the apartment where Juliette lived; 
there were in her house neighbors whom I did not 
like, and above all the apartment concealed memories 
which I thought it more convenient to forget. For 
fear that my plans might not be agreeable to Juliette 
I did not dare to reveal them too abruptly, but at the 
very first words I said about the matter she grew 
enthusiastic. 

“Yes! yes!” she cried out with joy. “I have been 
thinking of it myself, dearie. And do you know of 
what else I have been thinking? Guess, guess quickly, 
what your little wifie has been thinking of?” 

She placed both hands on my shoulders, and smiling: 


“Don’t you know?... Really you don’t?... 
Well! she has been thinking of having you come and 
live with her.... Oh! It’ll be so nice to have a 


pretty little apartment where we shall be alone, just 
the two of us, to love each other, isn’t that right, my 
Jean? ... You'll work and I'll sit right next to you 
and do some needle work without making a stir, and 
from time to time, I’ll embrace you to inspire you with 
great ideas. ... You shall see, my dear, whether I 
am a good housekeeper or not, whether I can take care 
of all your little matters. ... In the first place, I’ll 
arrange your things in the bureau. Every morning 


CALVARY 133 


you will find a fresh flower on it... . Then Spy will 
also have a nice little niche, all new, with red top- 
knots. . . And then we shall hardly go out at all... 
And we'll sleep as late as we wish... . And then... 
and then. ... Oh, how wonderful it will be!. . .” 

Then getting serious again, she said in a grave voice: 

“ Not to mention the fact that it will be a good deal 
cheaper. Just about half!” 

We rented an apartment on the Rue de Balzac and 
we busily fixed it up. That was an important task. 
We were shopping the whole day, examining rugs, 
choosing hangings, discussing arrangements and esti- 
mating things. Juliette would have liked to buy every- 
thing she saw, but she professed a preference for ela- 
borate furniture, for loud-colored draperies and heavy 
embroidery. The glitter of new gold, the dazzling 
effect of harsh colors attracted, fascinated her. When- 
ever I ventured to remark something to her, she would 
Say at once: 

“ How do men come to know about these things? . . 
Women know better.” 

She was obdurate in her desire to buy a kind of 
Arabian chest, frightfully daubed up, set with mother- 
of-pearl, ivory imitation stones, and of immense size. 

“You can see for yourself that it’s too large, that 
it won’t get into our house at all,” I said to her. 

“Do you really think so? Well how about sawing 
off the legs, dearie? ” 

And more than twenty times during the day she 
stopped in the middle of her conversation to ask me: 

“Well, do you really think it is too large? . . . That 
beautiful chest I mean.” 

In the carriage, as soon as she got in, Juliette nestled 
close to me, offered me her lips, smothered me with 
caresses, happy, radiant. 

“Oh! you naughty boy, who never said a word to 


134 CALVARY 


me, and who stood just looking at me, with his sad 
eyes. . . yes, your beautiful sad eyes that I love... 
you naughty! ... I had to start it all myself! ... 
hadn’t I? . . . otherwise you would have never dared, 
would you? ... Were you afraid of me, tell me? Do 
you remember when you took me in your arms, that 
evening? I did not know where I was, I could no 
longer see anything. ... My throat, my chest felt 
as though I had swallowed something very hot... . 
isn’t that funny. .. . I thought I was going to die. . . 
burned by you. ... It was so sweet, so sweet! ... 
Why, I have loved you since the first day we met... . 
No, I was in love with you before. ... Ah, you are 


laughing! ... You don’t believe then that you can 
love someone without knowing or seeing him?... 
Well I do! ... Iam sure of it! ...” 


My heart was beating so fast, these words were so 
new to me, that I could not find anything to say in 
reply; I was choking with happiness. All I could do 
was to clasp Juliette in my arms, mutter some inar- 
ticulate words and weep with joy. Suddenly she be- 
came thoughtful, the furrow on her forehead deepened, 
she withdrew her hand from mine. I was afraid I had 
offended her: 

“What’s the matter, my Juliette?” I asked her. 
“Why do you look so? ... Have I hurt you?” 

And Juliette, disconsolate, said’ with a sigh: 

“ The corner-buffet, my dear! . . . The corner-buffet 
for the parlor which we have entirely forgotten.” 

She quickly passed from laughter, from kisses to 
sudden gravity, mingled words of endearment with 
ceiling measurements, confused love with tapestry. . . 
It was delightful. 

In our room, in the evening, all this pretty childish- 
ness disappeared. Love stamped upon the face of 
Juliette something austere, deliberate and ferocious 


CALVARY 135 


which I could not explain; it changed her entirely. 
She was not depraved; on the contrary, her passion 
showed itself to be strong and normal, and in her 
caresses there was awe-inspiring nobility and courage. 
Her body trembled as if in terrible labor. 

My happiness lasted but a short time. . . . My hap- 
piness!... It is really remarkable that never, never 
have I been permitted to enjoy anything fully, and 
that invariably anxiety came to disturb the brief pe- 
riods of my happiness. Defenseless and powerless 
against suffering, not sure of myself and timid in the 
hours of happiness— such I have been all my life. 
Is it a tendency peculiar to my nature? A strange 
perversion of my sensibilities?. . . Or is it rather that 
happiness in my own case as well as in the case of 
everybody else is really deceptive, and that it is 
nothing but a more tormenting and more refined form 
of universal suffering? ... 

Now this for example. ... The faint glimmer of 
the night-lamp flickers feebly upon the curtains and 
the furniture; Juliette is asleep, early in the morning, 
the morning after our first night. One of her arms, 
bare, rests upon the sheet; the other, also bare, is 
gracefully coiled up under her nape. All around her 
face — which reflects the pallid light of the bed, a 
face which looks like that of a murdered person, with 
eyes encircled by dark rings—her loose black hair 
is scattered, sinuous and flowing like waves! I con- 
template her eagerly. ... She is sleeping close to 
me, with a deep calm sleep, like a child. And for the 
first time possession occasions no regret, no disgust in 
me; for the first time I am able to look at a woman 
who has just given herself to me. I cannot express 
my feelings at this moment. What I feel is something 
indefinable, something exceedingly sweet and at the 
same time very grave and holy, a sort of religious 


136 CALVARY 


ecstasy similar to the one which I experienced at the 
time of my first communion. . . I recognize the same 
mystic transport, the same great and sacred awe; it is 
like another revelation of God taking place in the 
' transplendent light of my soul. ... It seems to me 
that God has come down to me for the second time.... 
She sleeps, in the silence of the room, with her mouth 
half-open, her nostrils motionless; she sleeps with 
a sleep so gentle that I cannot even hear her breath- 
ing. ... A flower on the mantlepiece is there, wither- 
ing, and a whiff of its dying fragrance reaches me. 
I can’t hear Juliette at all, she is only asleep, she is 
breathing, she is alive and yet I can’t hear her. I move 
nearer to her and gently bend over her, almost touch- 
ing her with my lips, and in an almost inaudible voice 
I call her. 

“ Juliette! ” 

Juliette does not stir. But I feel her breath, fainter 
than that of the flower, her breath always so fresh, 
with which at this moment there is mingled, like a waft 
of warmth, her fragrant breath which blends with an 
imperceptible odor of decay. 

“ Juliette!” 

Juliette does not stir. But the sheet which follows 
the curves of her body, showing the shape of her limbs, 
loosens itself into a rigid crease, and the sheet looks 
to me like a shroud; And the thought of death sud- 
denly comes to my mind and lingers there. I begin to 
be afraid that Juliette is dead. 

“ Juliette!” 

Juliette does not stir. My whole being is now 
plunged into a frenzy of fear, and while in my ears 
the distant knell resounds, around the bed I see the 
light of a thousand funeral tapers trembling under the 
vibrations of a de profundis prayer. My hair stands 
on end, my teeth chatter and I shout, I shout: 


CALVARY 137 


“Juliette! Juliette!” 

At last Juliette moves her head, heaves a sigh and 
murmurs, as if in a dream: 

“Jean!... My Jean!” 

Forcefully I grasp her into my arms as if to defend 
her against some one; I draw her toward me and 
trembling, with my blood running cold, I beg her: 

“ Juliette!... My own Juliette. . . don’t sleep... 
Oh, please don’t sleep! ... You frighten me! . . Let 
me see your eyes; talk to me, talk to me!... 
And pinch me, pinch yourself, too, pinch me hard... . 
But don’t sleep any more, please. .. .” 

She cuddles into my arms, whispers some unintel- 
ligible words and falls asleep again, her head hanging 
on my shoulder.... But the apparition of death, 
stronger than the awakening of love, persists, and 
although I feel the regular beating of Juliette’s heart 
against my own, it does not vanish until day. 

How often since that time, when with her, I have 
felt the frigid touch of death in her fiery kisses! ... 
And how often in the midst of rapture there appeared 
to me the sudden and capering image of the singer 
at the Bouffes!. .. How many times did his lustful 
laugh drown the ardent words of Juliette!... How 
often I have heard him say to me, while his image 
kept leaping above me: “ Go ahead, glut yourself upon 
this imbecile body, upon this unclean body which I 
defiled!. .. Go on!... Go on!... wherever you 
touch your lips you will breathe the impure odor of my 
own; wherever your caresses may wander upon this 
body of a prostitute they will encounter the filthy 
marks of my own manhandling. . .. Go ahead, wash 
her, your Juliette, wash her in the lustral water of 
your love, cleanse her with the acid of your mouth. . . 
Strip off her skin with your teeth, if you will; you will 


138 CALVARY 


efface nothing, never, because the mark of infamy 
with which I have branded her is ineffaceable.” 

And I often had a passionate desire to question 
Juliette about this singer whose vision haunted me so 
much. But I had not the courage. I contented my- 
self with trying to get at the truth in an ingenious, 
roundabout way: often, in the midst of conversation 
I would mention a name unexpectedly, hoping, yes 
hoping that Juliette would be a little put out by it, that 
she would blush, would feel embarrassed and would 
say: “ Yes, that’s the one.” I thus exhausted the list 
of names of all the singers in all the theatres, without 
gaining the least evidence of perturbation in Juliette’s 
impenetrable attitude. 

It took us almost three months to install ourselves 
completely. The upholsterers could never get through 
with their work and Juliette’s caprices often called 
for changes that took a long time to accomplish. Every 
day she would come back from her shopping with new 
ideas about the decoration of the parlor, or the dress- 
ing room, The hangings in the bedroom had to be 
entirely changed three times because she did not like 
them. 

Finally one nice morning we took possession of our 
apartment on the Rue de Balzac.... It was high 
time we did. ... All this unsettled existence, this 
continuous hurry, these open trunks yawning like cof- 
fins, this brutal scattering of dear and intimate things, 
these heaps of linen, these pyramids of boxes turned 
upside down, these cut-up pieces of string which 
dragged all over, all this disorder, this chaos, this 
trampling underfoot of things with which are asso- 
ciated the dearest memories or most tender regrets, 
and above all this feeling of uncertainty, of terror, 
and the sad reflections which the act of leaving a 


pple ed CALVARY 139 


place occasions —all this made me uneasy, dejected 
and, must I say it, remorseful. 

While Juliette was moving about, bustling amidst 
bundles, I was asking myself whether I had not com- 
mitted some irreparable folly. Of course, I loved 
her. ... Ah! I loved her with all the power of my 
soul. So far, nothing except this passion which ob- 
sessed me more and more every day, interested me at 
all. Still, I regretted that I had yielded so easily and 
quickly to an infatuation that was perhaps fraught 
with the gravest consequences for her and myself. 
I was dissatisfied with myself for not having been able 
to resist Juliette’s wish, expressed in such delicious 
fashion, that I live together with her. ... Could we 
not love each other just as well if each of us lived 
separately and avoid the possible clashes over such 
sordid things as wall-paper, for example. 

And while the splendor of all this plush and the 
insolence of all these gilt objects in the midst of which 
we were now going to live frightened me, I felt a sor- 
rowful attachment for my own scanty furniture placed 
without order, for my little apartment, austere yet 
tranquil, and now empty—an attachment one has 
for beloved things that are dead. But Juliette would 
pass by, busy, agile and charming, would embrace 
and kiss me on her way, and there was such a life- 
giving joy in her whole being, a joy so easily mingled 
with astonishment and childish despair at anything 
lost, that my morose thoughts vanished as do the 
night owls at sunrise. 

Ah! the happy days that followed our moving from 
the Rue Saint Petersbourg! ... First we had to test 
every piece of furniture down to the smallest details. 
Juliette sat on every divan, lounge and sofa, causing 
the springs to creak. 

“You try it also, my dear,” she would say to me. 


140 CALVARY 


She examined every piece of furniture, scrutinized 
the hangings, tried the strings of the door curtain, 
moved a chair to a different place, smoothed a crease 
in the draperies. And every instant cries of admira- 
tion, of ecstasy were heard! 

Then she wanted to start the inspection of the 
apartment all over again with the windows closed 
and the lights burning, in order to see the effect pro- 
duced at night, never tiring of examining a thing more 
than once, running from one room to another, marking 
down every defect on a piece of paper. Then it was 
the wardrobe where she put her linen and mine with 
meticulous care and elaborate nicety and the consum- 
mate skill of a stall keeper. I chided her for assigning 
to me the better scentbags. 

“No! no! no! I want to have a little husband who 
uses perfume!” 

Of her old furniture and old knick-knacks, Juliette 
had kept only the terra-cotta statue of Love which 
again took its place of honor on the mantlepiece in the 
parlor. I, on the other hand, had brought over only 
my books and two very beautiful sketches by Lirat 
which I thought it a duty to hang up in my study. © 
Scandalized, Juliette cried with indignation: 

“What are you doing there, my dear?... Such 
horrible things in our new apartment!. .. Please put 
these horrible things away somewhere! Oh, put them 
away!” 

“My dear Juliette,” I answered somewhat provoked. 
“You have kept your terra-cotta statue of Love, not 
sop” 

“Certainly I have. ... But what has that to do 
with this? ... My terra-cotta statue is very, very 
lovely. Whereas that thing there... why really! 

. . . And then it’s improper! .. . Besides, every time 


CALVARY 141 


I look at the paintings of that fool Lirat I feel a pain 
in my stomach.” 

Before that I used to have the courage of my artistic 
convictions and. I defended them with fire. But now 
it seemed puerile on my part to engage in a discussion 
of art with Juliette, so I contented myself with hiding 
the pictures inside a press without much regret. 

Finally the day arrived when everything was in 
admirable order; everything in its place, the smallest 
objects resting smartly on the tables, console tables, 
windows; the stands decorated with large leafed 
plants; the books in the library within reach; Spy in 
his new niche and flowers everywhere. ... Nothing 
. was missing, nothing, not even a rose, whose stem 
bathed in a long thin glass vase standing on my desk. 
Juliette was radiant, triumphant; she repeated with- 
out end: 

“Look, look again how well your little wife has 
worked!” 

And resting her head on my shoulder with a tender 
look in her eyes and a genuinely agitated voice, she 
murmured: 

“Oh, my adored Jean, at last we are in our own 
home, our own home, just think of it!. . . How happy 
we shall be here, in our pretty nest!.. .” 

The next morning Juliette said to me: 

“It has been along time since you saw Monsieur 
Lirat. I don’t want him to think that I keep you from 
visiting him.” 

It was true, nevertheless. It really seemed as if 
for the last five months, I had forgotten all about 
poor Lirat. But had I really forgotten him? Alas no! 

. Shame kept me from going to him. ... Shame 
alone estranged me from him. ... I assure you that 
I would have never hesitated to announce to the whole 


142 CALVARY 


world: “I am Juliette’s lover!”; but I had not the 
courage to utter these words in Lirat’s presence. 
At first I had a notion to confess all to him, no 


matter what happened to our friendship. . . . I would 
say to myself: “all right, tomorrow I am going to see 
Lirat”. .. I would make up my mind firmly.... 
And the next day: “Not now. .. there is nothing 
pressing. .. . tomorrow!. . .” Tomorrow, always to- 
morrow!. .. And days, weeks, months passed... . 
Tomorrow! : 


Now that he had been told all about these things 
by Malterre, who even before my departure used to 
come and make his sofa groan, how could I broach 
the subject to him? . . . What could I say to him? .. 
How endure his look, his contempt, his anger... . 
His anger, perhaps!. . . But his contempt, his terrible 
silence, the disconcerting sneer which I already saw 
taking shape at the corner of his mouth. . .. No, no, 
really I did not dare!... To try to mollify him, to 
take his hand, to ask his forgiveness for my lack of 
confidence in him, to appeal to the generosity of his 
heart!. .. No! It would ill become me to assume 
such a part, and then Lirat with just one word could 
throw a. damper on me and stop my effusion... . 
What’s the use! . . . Each day that passed separated 
us further, estranged us from each other more and 
more. ..a few more months and there would no 
longer be any Lirat to reckon with in my life! ...I 
should prefer that rather than cross his threshold 
and face him in person. . . . I replied to Juliette: 

“Lirat?. .. Oh yes. ... I think I’ll do that some 
of these days!” . 

“No, no!” insisted Juliette.... “Today! You 
know him, you know how mean he is. God knows 
how many ugly things he must have said about us!” 

I had to make up my mind to see him, From the 


CALVARY 143 


Rue de Balzac to Rodrigue Place is but a short dis- 
tance. To postpone as long as possible the moment of 
this painful interview I made a long detour on my 
way, walking as far as the shop district of the Saint 
Honoré suburb. And I was thinking to myself: “ Sup- 
pose I don’t go to see Lirat at all. I can tell her, when 
I come back, that we have quarrelled, and I can in- 
vent some sort of a story that will forever relieve me 
of the necessity of this visit.” I felt ashamed of this 
boyish thought. . . . Then I hoped that Lirat was not 
at home! With what joy could I then roll up my 
card into a tube and slip it through the keyhole! Com- 
forted by this thought I at last turned in the direction 
of Rodrigue Place and stopped in front of the door 
of the studio—and this door seemed to fill me with 
fear. Still I rapped at it and presently a voice, Lirat’s 
voice, called: 

“Come in!” 

My heart beat furiously, a bar of fire stopped my 
throat —I wanted to flee. . 

“Come in!” the voice repeated. 

I turned the door knob. 

“ Ah! Is that you, Mintié,” Lirat exclaimed. “ Come 
on in.” 

Lirat was seated at his table, writing a letter. 

“May I finish this?” he said to me. “Just two 
more minutes and I'll be through.” 

He resumed writing. It was a relief not to feel upon 
myself the chill of his look. I took advantage of the 
fact that his back was turned to unburden my soul 
to him. 

“T have not seen you for such a long time, my good 
Lirat.” 

“Why, yes, my dear Mintié!” 

“T have moved.” 

“ Ah, is that so!” 


144 CALVARY 


“T live on the Rue de Balzac.” 

“ Nice place!” 

I was suffocating. . .. I made a supreme effort to 
gather all my strength. . . but by a strange aberra- 
tion I thought I would succeed better by adopting a 
flippant method of approach. Upon my word of honor! 
I railed, yes, railed at myself. 

“JT have come to tell you some news which will 


amuse you....Ha!....Ha!... which will amuse 
you... Iam sure...I...I... live with Juliette. 
...Ha!l...Ha!... with Juliette Roux... Juli- 
ette, you know. .. . Ha! Ha!” 


“ Congratulations!” He uttered this word “ con- 
gratulations ” in a perfectly calm, indifferent voice. . . 
Was it possible! No hiss, no anger, no jumping at 
me!... Just “ Congratulations!. ...” As one might 
say: “how do you expect that to interest me?” And 
his back bent over the table remained motionless with- 
out straightening up, without stirring!... His pen 
did not slip from his hand; he continued to write! 
What I told him just now he had known long ago. . . 
But to hear it out of my own mouth!. . . I was stupe- 
fied —and shall I confess it?p—I was wounded by 
the fact that the matter did not seem to affect him 
at all!. .. Lirat rose and rubbing his hands: 

“Well! what’s new?” he asked. 

I could not stand it any longer. I rushed toward 
him with tears in my eyes. 

“Listen to me,” I shouted sobbing. “ Lirat, for 
God’s sake, listen to me. . . . I did not act fairly to- 
ward you.... I know it. ...and I ask your for- 
giveness. ... I should have told you all.... But I 
did not have the courage to. .. . You frighten me. . . 
And then. . . you remember Juliette, the one you told 
me about, right here. . . you remember. . . she is the 


CALVARY 145 


one who kept me from doing that. ... Do you un- 
derstand?” 

“My dear Mintié,” interrupted Lirat, “I did not 
want you to tell me anything. I am neither your 
father nor your confessor. Do what you please, that 
does not concern me in the least.” 

I became excited. 

“You are not my father, that is true... but you 
are my friend. . . and I owe you all the confidence in 
the world.... Forgive me!... Yes, I live with 
Juliette, and I love her and she loves me! ... Is ita 
crime to seek a little happiness?... Juliette is not 
the kind of a woman you thought she was... she 
has been calumniated most odiously, Lirat.... She 
is kind and honest. ... Oh, don’t smile. . . she is 
honest!... She has some childish ways about her 
that would touch even you, Lirat. You don’t like her 
because you don’t know her. ... If you only knew 
how kind and considerate she is to me! Juliette wants 


me to work. ... She ardently believes in me, in my 
ability to create. ... Why it was she who sent me 
here to see you. I was ashamed and afraid. ... Yes 


she made me do that! Have a little consideration for 
her, Lirat. Love her a little, I beg of you!” 

Lirat became grave. He put his hand on my shoulder 
and, looking at me wistfully: 

“My dear child!” he said to me in a trembling 
voice, “ why do you tell me all that?” 

“ Because it is the truth, my dear Lirat!. . because 
I love you and I want to remain your friend. . . Show 
me that you are my friend no matter what happens... 
Here now, come to have dinner with us this evening, 
as we used to in the past, in my own house. Oh, please 
come!” 

“No,” he said. 


146 CALVARY 


And this “ no ” was relentless, final, curt, like a gun- 
shot. 

Lirat added: 

“ But you come often!. .. And whenever you feel 
like crying. .. the sofa is there... you know.... 
The tears of poor devils are quite known to it.” 

When the door was shut behind me, it seemed that 
something huge and heavy had closed itself upon my 
past, that walls higher than the sky and darker than 
the night had separated me forever from my decent 
life, from my dreams of art. There was anguish in my 
whole being. .. . For a minute I stood there, stupe- 
fied, with swinging arms, with eyes inordinately dis- 
tended, staring at that prophetic door behind which 
something had just come to a close, something had 
just died. 


CHAPTER VI 


beautiful apartment where she had promised her- 

self so much peace and happiness. Having ar- 
ranged her wardrobes and put her knick-knacks in 
order, she did not know what to do next and was sur- 
prised at this discovery. The tapestry no longer ex- 
cited her admiration, reading afforded her no distrac- 
tion. She passed from one room to another, without 
knowing what to do, what to busy her mind with, 
yawning, stretching herself. She shut herself up in 
her room where she spent hours in dressing herself, 
in trying on new clothes in front of the looking glass, 
in turning the faucet of the bath tub, which occupa- 
tion amused her for a while, in combing Spy and in 
making elaborate bows for him from the bands of her ° 
old hats. 

Managing the house might have filled the void of her 
idle days, but I soon realized with chagrin that Juliette 
was not at all the housekeeper she had boasted she 
was. She was careless, had no taste, was preoccupied 
only with her linen underwear and her dog; every- 
thing else was of no importance to her, and things 
took their own course or rather went according to the 
wishes of the servants. Our renewed staff of do- 
mestics consisted of a cook, an old, sloppy woman, 
grasping and ill-tempered, whose cooking talents did 
not extend beyond tapioca pudding, hashed veal with 
white sauce and salad; a chamber maid, Celestine, im- 
pudent and depraved, who respected only people who 
spent large sums of money, and a housekeeper, Mother 
Sochard, who prayed incessantly and often used to get 


J vecssita was not long in wearying of this 


148 CALVARY 


frightfully drunk in order to fofget her troubles, as 
she said: her husband who beat her and took away her 
money, and her daughter who was good for nothing. 

The waste was enormous, our table very bad and 
the rest correspondingly so. Whenever we happened 
to have visitors, Juliette would order from Bignon 
the rarest and most elaborate dishes. I viewed with 
displeasure the uncommon intimacy, a sort of bond 
of friendship, which had sprung up between Juliette 
and Celestine. When dressing her mistress, the maid 
told her stories which the former enjoyed immensely ; 
she disclosed improper secrets of the homes where she 
had served and advised Juliette in all matters. “ At 
Mme. K’s they do it this way — at Mme. V’s they do it 
that way.” That they were “ swell places ” goes without 
saying. Juliette often went into the linen room where 
Celestine was sewing and stayed there for hours, seated 
on a heap of bed sheets, listening to the inexhaustible 
gossip of the servant-girl... From time to time an argu- 
ment would arise over some stolen thing or some 
neglected duty. Celestine would get excited, hurling 
the grossest insults, knocking the furniture, screaming 
in her squeaky voice: 

“Well!. . Many thanks to you!.. This is some 
dirty place!. . A goose like that has the nerve to ac- 
cuse one!.. Well look here, my pretty one, I am 
going to shake myself free from you and your boob 
over there who has the face of a dunce.” 

Juliette would tell her to get out immediately, not 
wishing her even to stay out her week. 

“Yes, yes! Pack up at once, you nasty girl. . . right 
away!” 

She would come to sulk in my presence, pale and 
trembling: 

“Ah! my dear, that vile creature, that wretched 
woman! ... And I who was so kind to her! . . .” 


CALVARY 149 


In the evening they would make up again, and 
amidst laughter which resounded louder than ever, 
Celestine’s voice would baw! out: 

“T should say the Countess was a rude slut!” 

One day Juliette said to me: 

“ Your little wifie has nothing to put on. She is as 
naked as a new born child, the poor thing!” 

And so there were new visits to the dressmaker’s, 
to the milliner’s, to the linen shop; and she again be- 
came gay, vivacious, affectionate. The shadow of 
boredom which had crossed her countenance disap- 
peared. ... In the midst of materials, laces, among 
plumes and gewgaws, her whole being expanded and 
shone forth. Her tender fingers experienced a phys- 
ical delight in handling satin, in touching crepe, in 
stroking velvet, in losing themselves in the milky 
white waves of fine batiste. The smallest piece of silk, 
when she draped it into something, at once assumed 
the pretty appearance of a living thing; out of braid 
and lace trimmings she could draw the most exquisite 
harmonies. Although I was very much alarmed by 
these expensive whims, I could not refuse Juliette any- 
thing, and I abandoned myself to the joy of seeing 
her so happy, to the delight of seeing her so charm- 
ing — her, whose beauty rendered all inanimate ob- 
jects about her beautiful, her, who put the breath of 
gracious life into everything she touched! 

For more than a month packages and strange cases 
were being delivered to us every evening. . . . Dresses 
followed dresses, hats followed cloaks, umbrellas and 
embroidered chemises; the most expensive linens ac- 
cumulated in heaps and filled all the drawers, presses, 
wardrobes. 

“You see, my dear,” Juliette explained to me, dis- 
cerning amazement in my glance. “ You see I did 
not have anything. .. . This is all I need. From now 


150 CALVARY 


on, all I’ll have to do is to receive people. ... Ah 
don’t be afraid! . . . I am very economical. See here, 
I have had a high body made in all my gowns for 
every day use on the street, and a decolleté to wear 
at the Opera! Just figure out how many dresses that 
will save me... . Ong. . . two. .. three. . . four. . . 
five. . ..dresses, my dear! ... You see now!” 

For the first appearance at the theatre she put on a 
gown that was the sensation of the evening. As long 
as the tormenting affair lasted I was the most miser- 
able man in the world. . . . I felt the covetous glances 
of the entire audience directed on Juliette, glances 
that devoured her, that disrobed her, glances that de- 
file the woman one adores. I would have liked to hide 
Juliette deep in the loge and throw a thick dark woolen 
cloak on her shoulders, and with heart clawed by 
hatred I wished the theatre had sunk into the ground 
through some sudden cataclysm, that by a sudden 
collapse of its ceiling and chandeliers it had crushed 
to a powder all these men, each of whom was stealing 
a little of Juliette’s chastity, a little of her love from 
me. She, on the other hand, triumphant, seemed to 
say: “I love you all, gentlemen, for thinking me beau- 
tiful. You are nice people.” 

Scarcely did we enter our house when I drew Juliette 
toward me and for a long, long time held her pressed 
to my heart, repeating without end: “You love me, 
Juliette, don’t you?” but the heart of Juliette was no 
longer listening to me. Seeing that I was sad, no- 
ticing that from my eyelids tears were about to fall 
upon her cheek, she freed herself from my embrace 
and said somewhat angrily: 

“What! I was the prettiest, the most beautiful of 
them all! ... And you are not satisfied yet?... 
And you are crying yet!... That is not nice at 
all! ... What more do you want?” 


CALVARY 151 


Our first disagreeable quarrel arose over Juliette’s 
friends. Gabrielle Bernier, Jesselin and some other 
people, formerly brought over to our house at the Rue 
de Saint Petersbourg by Malterre, again began to pur- 
sue us at the Rue de Balzac. I frankly told her so; 
she seemed very much surprised. 

“What have you against Monsieur Jesselin?” she 
asked me. She used to call the others by their Chris- 
tian names. . . but she pronounced the name Monsieur 
Jesselin with great respect. 

“T certainly have nothing against him, my dear. . . 
But I don’t like him, he gets on my nerves. . . he is 
ridiculous. Here, then, I think are good reasons for 
not wishing to see that idiot.” 

Juliette was shocked. That I should have called 
a man of Monsieur Jesselin’s importance and reputa- 
tion an idiot was quite incomprehensible to her. She 
looked at me with fear as if I had just uttered a terrible 


blasphemy. 

“Monsieur Jesselin, an idiot!... He. ... sucha 
gentleman, so serious minded, and who has been to 
India! ... Don’t you know that he is a member of 
the Geographical Society?” 


“What about Gabrielle Bernier? .. Is she also a 
member of the Geographical Society?” 

As a rule Juliette never lost her temper. When she 
was angry her look became severe, the wrinkle on her 
forehead deepened, her voice lost a little of its sweet 
sonorousness. She answered simply: 

“ Gabrielle is my friend.” 

“That’s just what I object to.” 

There was a moment of silence. Juliette, seated in 
an armchair, was fingering the lace of her morning 
gown, thinking. An ironic smile wandered on her 
lips. 

“Do you mean to say that I must not see anyone? 


152 CALVARY 


... Is that what you want? ... Well that’s going 
to be very amusing. ... We shall never go out any 
more. . . we shall live like beasts! .. .” 

“ That’s not the question at all, my dear. . . . I have 
some friends. . . I’ll ask them to come... .” 

“Oh yes, I know your friends. . . . I can see them 
right before me, writers, painters. .. people whom 
one doesn’t understand when they talk. . . and who 
borrow money from us. . . Thank you very much!..” 

I felt offended and quickly replied: 

“ My friends are honest people, do you hear, with 
talent, whereas that idiot and that nasty woman! .. .” 

“ T think we have had enough of this,” Juliette impe- 
riously said. “Is that your wish? ... All right. I 
shall close my door to them. Only when you insisted 
on my living with you, you should have told me that 
you wanted to bury me alive. I would have known 
what to do then... .” 

She rose. I was not even thinking of telling her 
that, on the contrary, it was she who had wished that 
we keep house together. Realizing that it was useless 
to argue any further I took her hand: 

“ Juliette,” I entreated her. 

“Well, what do you want?” 

“ Are you angry?” 


“JT, on the contrary, Iam very much contented... .” 
“ Juliette!” 
“Come, let go of me... quit... you hurt me.” 


Juliette was sulky all day; when I said something 
to her she did not answer or contented herself with 
articulating monosyllables curtly and with irritation. 
I was unhappy and angry at the same time; I would 
have liked to embrace her and to beat her, to shower 
kisses and kicks on her. At dinner she still kept the 
air of an offended woman, with her lips firmly closed 
and a disdainful look in her eyes. In vain did I try 


CALVARY 153 


to appease her by humble conduct and sad repentant 
looks; her assumed sullenness remained unchanged, 
on her brow there was still that dark furrow which 
made me uneasy. At night, in bed, she took a book 
and turned her back to me. And the back of her per- 
fumed neck to which my lips loved to cling with rap- 
turous joy, now seemed to me harder than a stone 
wall.... Within me deep resentment was stirring, 
but I forced myself not to betray it. In the measure 
that I was filled with rage, my voice sought sweeter 
accents, it grew gentler and more beseeching. 


“Juliette! my Juliette! ... Speak to me, please! 
Speak to me! Did I offend you, was I too harsh 

with you? I know I was. ... Well, I am sorry and 
I ask your forgiveness. ... But only speak to me.” 


My impression was that Juliette was not listening 
to me at all. She was cutting the pages of the book, 
and the noise of the friction of the knife against the 
paper annoyed me terribly. 

“My Juliette. ... Please understand me.... It 

is because I love you that I said that.... It is be- 
cause I wish to see you pure, respected, and because 
it seems to me that all those are unworthy of you. . 
If I did not love you, would that make any difference 
to me? ... And you think that I don’t want you to 
go out! ... Why no.... We shall go out often, 
every evening. ... Ah, please don’t be like that! ... 
I was wrong!... Scold me, strike me.... But 
only speak to me, please speak to me!” 

She continued turning the pages of the book. The 
words were throttled in my throat. 

“It is not fair to act the way you do, Juliette. It 
is not nice at all to be like that. .. . Since I admitted 
my guilt! Ah, what pleasure do you get out of tor- 
turing me like this? ... Didn’t I say I was sorry? 
Come on, Juliette, I admit I was wrong! ” 


154 CALVARY 


Not a muscle in her body moved in response to my 
supplication. Her nape exasperated me more than 
ever. Amidst locks of silky hair I now saw eyes which: 
railed at me and a mouth which mocked me. And I 
had an impulse to strike her, to belabor her with my 
fists, to beat her till she bled. 

“ Juliette!” I shouted. 

And my fingers, shriveled, spread apart and hooked 
like talons of a bird of prey, came close to her, in 
spite of myself, ready to claw this nape, impatient to 
tear it to pieces. 

“ Juliette!” 

Juliette slowly turned her head, looked at me with 
contempt, without fear. 

“What do you want?” she asked. 


“What do I want? ... What do I want?” 
I was going to threaten her.... I half arose in 
bed, I was gesticulating violently. ... And suddenly 


my rage subsided, I came close to Juliette, crouched 
before her, filled with repentance, and kissing that per- 
fumed and beautiful nape: 

“What I want, my dear, is that you should be 
happy. ... That you shall receive your friends. .. . 
It was so foolish on my part to demand of you what I 
did! . . .° Aren’t you the best of women? ... Don’t 
I love you? ... Ah, hereafter I shall have no other 
wish than yours, I promise you! ... And you'll see 
how nice I am going to be to them! ... Wait. ... 
Why should you not inyite Gabrielle for dinner? .. . 
And Jesselin also?” 

“No! No! You say it now, but tomorrow you'll 
reproach me for it.... No! No!... I don’t want 
to force upon you people whom you despise — nasty 
women and idiots!” 

“T don’t know where my head was when I said 
that.... I don’t despise them at all... on the 


CALVARY 155 


contrary I like them very much. ... Invite both of 
them. ... And I’ll go and get a box at the Vaude- 
ville.” 

“cc No ! ”? 


“T implore you!” 

Her voice became less harsh, she closed the book. 

“Well! We'll see tomorrow.” 

Really, at that moment I loved Gabrielle, Jesselin, 
Celestine —I even thought I loved Malterre. 

I no longer worked. Not that love of work deserted 
me, but I no longer had the creative faculty in me. I 
used to sit down at my desk every day, with blank 
sheets of paper before me, searching for ideas, and 
failing to find them, I would again relapse into anxie- 
ties of the present, which meant Juliette, into dread 
of the future, which again meant Juliette! ... Just 
as a drunkard clutches and turns his empty bottle to 
get the last drop of liquor out of it, so I searched my 
brains in the hope of squeezing the least bit of an 
idea out of it.... Alas! My head was empty! 

It was empty and weighed upon my shoulders like 
an enormous ball of lead! ... My mentality was al- 
ways slow in getting started: it required stimulation, 
it had to be lashed with a whip. Because of my ill- 
balanced sensibility, my passive nature, I easily 
yielded to intellectual or moral influences, whether 
good or bad. And again, Lirat’s friendship was quite 
useful to me in the past. My own ideas melted in the 
warmth of his spirit; his conversation opened for me 
new horizons hitherto unsuspected ; whatever confused 
ideas I had were cleared up, they assumed a more 
definite form which I endeavored to express; he taught 
me how to see, to understand things and made me 
delve with him into the mysteries of life. 

Now, the clear horizons toward which I was led 
shrunk and were shut off before me daily, almost 


156 CALVARY 


hourly, and night was coming, black night, which to 
me was not only visible but tangible, for I could ac- 
tually touch this monstrous night, I felt its darkness 
stuck fast in my hair, glued to my fingers, coiled 
around my body in clammy rings... . 

My study room opened into a yard, or rather a little 
garden shaded by two large plane-trees and bounded 
by a wall that had lattice work and was covered with 
ivy. Behind this wall, in the midst of another garden, 
the grey and very high facade of a house rose, accost- 
ing me with five rows of windows. On the third floor 
an old man sat near the window opening which en- 
cased him like a picture frame. He wore a cap of 
black velvet, a checkered morning robe, and he never 
stirred. Shrunk into himself, his head drooping on 
his chest, he seemed asleep. Of his face I could see 
only wrinkles of yellowish, wrinkled flesh, dark cavi- 
ties and locks which looked like tufts of a soiled beard, 
resembling some strange vegetation sprouting on the 
trunks of dead trees. Sometimes the profile of a wom- 
an would bend over him sinisterly, and this profile 
had the appearance of an owl perched upon the aged 
man’s shoulder; I could discern its hooked bill and 
round eyes, cruel, avaricious and bloodthirsty. When 
the sun shone into the garden, the window opened 
and I heard a shrill, piercing, angry voice which never 
ceased screaming reproaches. Then the old man would 
shrink into himself still farther, his head would begin 
to oscillate slightly, then he would become motionless 
again, still more buried in the folds of his morning 
robe, still deeper sunk in his armchair. 

I used to sit for hours and watch the unhappy man, 
and I fancied terrible tragedies, some fatal love affair, 
a noble life bungled, crushed and ruined by that wom- 
an with the owl face. I pictured to myself this living 
corpse as beautiful, young and strong.... Perhaps 


CALVARY 157 


he had been an artist once upon a time, a scientist, or 
simply a happy and kind-hearted man. And tall and 
upright, with a gaze full of hope, he marched towards 
- glory or happiness. ... One day he met that woman 
at the house of a friend .. . and that woman, too, 
wore a perfumed veil, a small muff, an otter skin cap, 
a heavenly smile, and an air of angelic sweetness. ... 
And forthwith he fell in love with her. . . . I followed 
step by step the development of his love affair, I 
counted up his weaknesses, his moments of cowardice, 
his growing downfalls up to the time of his sinking 
into this armchair for cripples and paralytics. 

And what I imagined his life was to him, my own 
life was to me, those were my own feelings, it was my 
own dread of the future, my own anguish. ... Little 
by little my hallucination took on a singular physical 
form, and it was myself that I saw in this velvet cap, 
in this morning robe with this battered body, this 
murky beard, and Juliette who stood over my shoulder 
like an owl. ... 

Juliette! ... She walked about in the study, 
weary of body, her whole figure betraying boredom, 
yawning and sighing. She could not think of any- 
thing to distract her. Most often she would place the 
card table not far from me and lose herself in the card 
combinations of a complicated “patience,” or she 
would stretch herself out on the sofa, spread a napkin 
over her dress, place upon it some tiny instruments of 
tortoise shell, microscopic containers of ointment, and 
begin polishing her nails, fiercely filing them and mak- 
ing them shine more lustrously than agate. She would 
examine them every five minutes, looking for the re- 
flection of her image in the polished surfaces: 

“Look my dear! Aren’t they beautiful! And you, 
too, Spy, look at your mistress’ pretty nails.” 

The light friction of the nail brush, the impercepti- 


158 CALVARY 


ble creaking of the sofa, Juliette’s remarks, her con- 
versation with Spy —all this was sufficient to put to 
rout the few ideas which I strove to bring together. 
My thoughts would turn immediately to ordinary 
matters, and I meditated upon painful things and lived 
sorrowful things over again. ... Juliette.... Did 
I love her? Many times this question arose in my 
mind, pregnant with horrible doubt. ... Had I not 
been deceived by the stupefaction of my senses? .. . 
Was not this thing which I took for love, the ephe- 
meral and fleeting manifestation of a pleasure as yet 
untasted? ... Juliette! . . . Of course I loved her. . . 

But this Juliette whom I loved, was she not alto- 
gether different, was she not the Juliette that I had 
myself created, that had been born of my own imagi- 
nation, that had originated in my own brains, whom 
I had endowed with a soul, with a spark of divinity, 
whom I had fashioned into being with the ideal es- 
sence of angels? ... And did I not still love her as 
one does a beautiful book, a beautiful verse, a beauti- 
ful statue, a visible and tangible realization of an ar- 


tist’s dream! ... But this other Juliette! ... This 
one here? ... This pretty, senseless, ignorant ani- 
mal, this knick-knack, this piece of cloth, this noth- 
ingri....’. 


I studied her carefully while she was polishing her 
nails... . Oh, how I would have liked to break this 
neck and sound its emptiness, to open this heart and 
probe its nothingness! And I said to myself: “ What 
sort of a life will mine be with this woman whose 
tastes are only for pleasure, who is happy only when 
she is dressed up, whose every wish costs a fortune, 
who in spite of her chaste appearance, has an instinc- 
tive predilection for vice; who used to leave unhappy 
Malterre every evening, without a single regret, with- 
out a single thought; who will leave me tomorrow, 


CALVARY 159 


perhaps; this woman who is a living denial of my 
aspirations, of my ideals; who will never, never enter 
into my intellectual life; and lastly this woman who 
already weighs upon my intelligence like folly, upon 
my whole being like a crime.” 

I had a notion to flee, to tell Juliette: “I am going 
out, I’ll be back in an hour,” and never to return to 
this house where the very ceiling was more oppressive 
to me than the lid of a coffin, where the air stifled me, 
where the very furniture seemed to say to me: “ Leave 
this place” ... But no! ... I loved her, and it was 
this very Juliette that I loved, not the other one who 
has gone the way of all dreams! . . . I loved her with 
all her qualities which made me suffer, I loved her in 
spite of all her lack of understanding, I loved her with 
all her frivolity, with all her suspected perversions; I 
loved her with that tormenting love which a mother 
has for her afflicted child. 

Have you ever met a poor creature huddled up be- 
hind the door on some wintry day, a wretched human 
being with chapped lips and chattering teeth, shiver- 
ing in his tattered rags? . . . And when you met him, 
were you not carried away by a feeling of keen pity, 
and did you not have a desire to take him and warm 
him against your breast, give him something to eat, 
cover his shivering body with warm clothes?... 
That is how I loved Juliette; I loved her with an im- 
mense pity . . . ah, don’t laugh, with a mother’s pity, 
with an endless pity! ... 

“ Aren’t we going out, my dear? It would be so 
nice to take a stroll through the Bois.” 

And casting her eyes on the blank sheet of paper 
on which I had not written a line: 

“Ts that all you wrote? ... Well! ... You do 
not seem to have worked very hard. . . . And here I 
have been sitting around all this time to inspire you 


160 CALVARY 


to work! ... Oh, well, I know you won’t get any- 
where. . . . You are too lazy!” 

Ere long we began going out every day and every 
evening. I did not resist any longer, almost happy 
to escape from the deadly aversion and despondent 
thoughts with which our apartment inspired me, es- 
cape from the symbolic vision of the old man, from 
myself. . . . Ah, above all from myself. In a crowd, 
in the tumult, in this feverish haste of a pleasure-hunt- 
ing life I hoped to find forgetfulness, to be able to 
dull my feeling, to subdue my rebellious spirit, to 
suppress the voice of my past which I heard grum- 
bling within me. And since I could not raise Juliette 
to my level I lowered myself down to her own. 

Ah, those serene heights where the sun was reign- 
ing and toward which I had been climbing slowly 
with such terrific effort! . . . I must descend into the 
pit at one dash, in a single, instantaneous, inevitable 
downfall, even if I crushed my head against the rocks 
or disappeared in the bottomless mire. With me it 
was no longer a question of escape. If occasionally 
the idea did pierce the haze of my mind, if, in the 
errings of my will-power, I sometimes did perceive a 
distant way out where duty seemed to call me, I, in 
order to break away from the idea, in order not to 
rush hastily toward that end, clung tenaciously to the 
false pretenses of honor. . . . Could I leave Juliette! 
I who insisted that she leave Malterre! .. . What 
will become of her when I am gone? ... Why no, 
no!—I was lying to myself. ...I did not want to 
leave her because I loved her, because I pitied her, 
because. . . . But was it not myself that I loved, my- 
self that I pitied? ... Ah, I no longer knew! I no 
longer knew! 

And then again you should not think that the abyss 
into which I had fallen was a sudden revelation to 


CALVARY 161 


me... . Don’t you believe it! I saw it from afar, I 
saw its black opening yawning fearfully, and I ran 
toward it. I leaned over the edge to inhale the in- 
fected odor of its filth, I said to myself: “There is 
where wasted lives and corrupted beings are dashed 
and swallowed up. . . . Here one can never come up 
again, never!” And I plunged into it.... 

Despite the threatening sky overcast with clouds, 
the balcony of the café is crowded with people. There 
is not a vacant table, the cabarets, the circus shows, 
the theatres have poured forth the scum of their ha- 
bitués here. Everywhere are bright-colored dresses 
and black frock coats, ladies adorned with plumes like 
horses in a parade, weary, sick looking and sallow; 
flurried fops with heads drooped upon their button 
holes without flowers, and nibbling the ends of their 
canes with ape-like gestures. Some of them with legs 
crossed in order to show their black silk socks em- 
broidered with red flowerets, hats pushed over slightly 
toward the back, are whistling the latest hit — the 
air which has just now been sung at the Ambassa- 
deur, to the accompaniment of the creaking of seats, 
the clatter of glasses and bottles. 

The last of the lights in front of the opera has been 
extinguished. But all around it the windows of the 
club-houses and brothels are a red blaze, like openings 
into hell. On the street, parked near the curb, are 
worn-out and dilapidated open coaches strung out in 
triple file. Some of the drivers are drowsing in their 
seats; others gathering into small groups which pre- 
sent a comical appearance in their ill-fitting liveries, 
are munching cigar stubs, and talking with loud bursts 
of laughter, telling salacious stories about their clients. 
One incessantly hears the shrill voice of the newspa- 
per vendors who run back and forth shouting, in the 
midst of their crisp outcries, the name of some well- 


162 CALVARY 


known woman, or some scandalous piece of news, 
while street arabs, gliding between the tables, cunning 
as cats, are selling obscene pictures, half revealed, to 
awaken dormant passions, to stir up curiosities gone 
to sleep. And little girls whose premature depravity 
has already blighted their gaunt, childish faces are 
offering for sale bouquets of flowers, smiling with a 
dubious smile, charging their glances with the ripe 
and hideous immodesty of old prostitutes. Inside the 


cabaret all the tables are taken. ... There is nota - 


single vacant place. ... People are drinking cham- 
pagne without really wanting it and munching sand- 
wiches without in the least caring for them. Occa- 
sionally curious people enter the place, before going 
to their clubs or to bed, by force of habit or from a 
mere desire to show off or to see if there is “anything 
doing” there. Slowly and slouching in their walk, 
they slink about the groups of guests, stopping to 
chat with their friends here and there and, waving 
their hands in greeting to some one at a distance, look 
at themselves in the mirrors, fix their white cravats 
which stick out from under their light overcoats, then 
leave, their minds enriched with a few new slang ex- 
pressions of the underworld, with a few more scandals 
picked up here and upon which their idleness will 
thrive for a whole day. 

The women with elbows resting on the table, an ice 
cream soda in front of them, their weak faces, hatched 
with fine pink lines, supported by long gloved hands, 
assume a languid air, a suffering mien and a sort of 
consumptive dreaminess. They exchange mysterious 
winks and imperceptible smiles with their neighbors 
at nearby tables, while the gentleman accompanying 
them, silent and affectedly courteous, strikes the point 
of his shoes with the tip of his cane. The gathering 
presents a brilliant spectacle variegated with lace and 


CALVARY 163 


baubles, bright trimmings and pompons, tinged 
plumes and flowers in full bloom, curls of blond hair, 
tresses of dark hair and the glitter of diamonds. Every 
one is at his fighting post, the young and the old, 
beginners with beardless faces, grey-haired veterans, 
naive gulls and crafty spongers, here were social scan- 
dals, false situations, riotous vice, base covetousness, 
shameful barter —all the flowers of corruption which 
sprout — mingle, grow and thrive in the dunghill 
warmth of Paris. 

It was into this atmosphere charged with ennui, 
restlessness and heavy odors that we used thereafter 
to come every evening. During the day, visits to the 
dressmakers, the Bois, the races; in the evening, res- 
taurants, theatres and fashionable gatherings. Wher- 
ever this special brand of society people came to- 
gether, one was certain to see us; we were even made 
much of because of Juliette’s beauty which began to 
be the subject of people’s talk, and her dresses which 
called forth the envy and emulation of other women. 
We no longer dined at home. Our apartment served 
us as hardly anything more than a place to dress. 
When Juliette was dressing she grew harsh, even cruel. 
The wrinkle on her forehead cut into her skin like a 
scar. She uttered disjointed words, grew angry, 
seemed to be incensed to the point of breaking up 
things. 

All around her the room seemed as if it had been 
pillaged: trunks were opened, skirts thrown on the 
carpet, fans taken out of their cases and scattered on 
the chairs, opera glasses left on the furniture; muslin 
gowns were lying in heaps in the corners, the floor 
was strewn with flowers, towels, soiled with rouge, 
gloves, stockings, veils were hanging on the branches 
of the candlesticks. And in the midst of this con- 
fusion, Celestine, agile, brazen-faced, cynical, was 


164 CALVARY 


going through all sorts of evolutions, jumping, sliding, 
kneeling at the feet of her mistress, sticking a pin 
_ here, adjusting the pleats there, knotting threads, her 
soft, flabby hands, made to handle filthy things, gliding 
all over Juliette’s body with affection. She was happy, 
she no longer replied to insinuating remarks, to bitter 
reproaches, and her eyes, persistently ironical, shining 
with a flame of vulgar depravity were riveted on me. 

It was only in public, in the glare of lights, under 
the cross fire of men’s gazes that Juliette again found 
her smile and expression of joy mixed with a little 
wonderment and frankness which she reserved only 
for this repugnant crowd of debauchées. And we used 
to come to this cabaret accompanied by Gabrielle, by 
Jesselin, by people met I don’t know where, and pre- 
sented to us by I don’t know whom, by idiots and 
princes, by the whole batch of international and street- 
corner crooks whom we dragged along with us. 

“What are you going to do tonight?” 

“Tam going with the Mintié crowd.” 

Jesselin gave us information about the people in the 
place; he knew all the inside facts of high society life 
and spoke of it with a sort of admiration in spite of 
all the shameful or tragic details which he told us. 

“That man there, who has a crowd of people around 
him and who is listened to respectfully, used to be 
a valet-de-chambre. His master fired him for theft. 
But he became the keeper of a gambling house, con- 
ducted all kinds of illegitimate joints, became cashier 
of the Club, then skilfully disappeared for a few years. 
At the present time he is part owner of many gambling 
houses, has an interest in the race track, has unlimited 
credit with the stock-brokers, owns horses and a man- 
sion where he receives people. He used to loan money 
secretly at one hundred percent interest to ladies in 
financial straits whose gullible natures he would first 


CALVARY 165 


test. Ostentatiously generous, buying pictures of the 
most expensive kind, he passes for an honorable man 
and patron of the arts. In the papers they speak of 
him with great respect. 

“And that other big, stout fellow whose fleshy, 
wrinkled face is eternally split by an idiotic laugh? 
He is but a child! ... Hardly eighteen years old. 
He has a mistress known to all, with whom he appears 
in public every Monday at the Bois, and also has a 
teacher, an Abbot whom he takes to the lake every 
Tuesday in the same carriage. His mother has thus 
conceived of the education of her son, wishing him to 
lead a life of religious saintliness on the one hand and 
of gallant adventures on the other. Aside from that 
he gets drunk every evening, and horse-whips his old 
fool of a mother. A real type!” Jesselin summed up. 

“That duke over there, who bears one of the most 
illustrious names in France! Ah! that swell duke! the 
king of spongers! He comes in timidly like a fright- 
ened dog, looks through his monocle, takes in the 
smell of supper, sits down and devours some ham and 
minced liver pie. Perhaps he has not dined yet, this 
duke; undoubtedly he has just come back from an 
unsuccessful daily visit to the café Anglais, or the 
Maison Doré or Bignon’s, in quest of some friend who 
will treat him to a meal. Being on very good terms 
with women and horse dealers, he runs errands for 
the former and rides the horses for the latter. In- 
structed to say wherever he goes: ‘Oh! What a 
charming woman!’... ‘Oh! what a _ wonderful 
horse!’ he receives a few louis for this service with 
which he pays his valet. 

“Here is another great nobleman who is gradually 
and hopelessly sinking into the mire of illicit business 
and secret promotion of vice. Once upon a time that 
fellow was quite the rage of society. Despite his 


166 CALVARY 


stoutness which is now evident, despite the puffiness 
of his flesh, he still has an elegant way of carrying 
himself, and the air of a gentleman. In the disreput- 
able places and questionable circles which he frequents 
he plays the remunerative réle which was played fifty 
years ago by head waiters at table d’hdtes. His cour- 
teousness and education were an asset to him, which 
he made use of to perfection. He knew how to take 
advantage of the dishonesty of others as well as of 
his own, for no one was as skilful in composing matri- 
monial difficulties of his patrons to the satisfaction 
of all concerned as he was. 

“That livid face there, set in a frame of whiskers 
turning grey, that miniature mouth, that lustreless eye? 
No one knows who he really is! For a long time sin- 
ister rumors have been current about his person, ru- 
mors of bloody affairs. At first people were afraid of 
him and tried to keep away from him. It’s nothing 
but an old memory after all! For the rest, he spends 
a lot of money. What does it matter if a few drops 
of blood do roll on top of piles of gold! Women are 
crazy about it. 

“That young handsome man with mustache grace- 
fully turned up? One day when he did not have a sou 
to his name, his parents having stopped his allowance, 
the ingenious notion occurred to him to pretend that 
he was repentant. He demonstratively quit an old 
mistress he had and returned to his parents. A young 
lady, his playmate when he was a child, adored him. 
She was rich. He married her. But on the very eve- 
ning of his wedding day he left her, taking the dowry 
with him, and went back to his old mistress. She is 
an excellent woman,” added Jesselin, “she really is! 

“And all those pimps and those who have been 
chased out of the clubs, expelled from universities, 
ruined at the stock exchange; and foreigners coming 


CALVARY 167 


from the devil knows where, whom one scandal attracts 
to one place and another scandal draws off to another, 
and those living outside the pale of the law and 
bourgeois esteem, who claim to be the royalty of 
Paris, before whom everybody bows down — they all 
swarm here, arrogant, free, disreputable!” 

Juliette was listening, amused by the stories, at- 
tracted by this filth and crime, flattered by this ignoble 
homage which she felt the glances of these fools and 
criminals were paying her. But she preserved her 
modest bearing, her maiden charm, all her graces, self- 
conscious and inviting at one and the same time, for 
the sake of which, one day at Lirat’s, I earned damna- 
tion! 

Faces grow more pallid now, features become drawn 
out. Fatigue swells and colors the eyelids. One after 
another they leave the cabaret, tired and worried. Do 
they know what the next day has in store for them, 
what troubles await them, what disasters lie in ambush 
for them? Once in a while the report of a pistol shot 
creates a void in the ranks of this gang! Perhaps to- 
morrow will be their turn? Tomorrow! Perhaps it 
will be my turn, too? Ah! Tomorrow! The ever pres- 
ent menace of tomorrow! And we go home again, 
without saying a word to one another, sad and weary. 

The boulevard was deserted. An immense silence 
was weighing heavily over the city. Only the win- 
dows of the brothel houses were aglare, like the eyes 
of some huge beasts crouching in the depth of night. 

Without knowing exactly the state of my financial 
affairs, I felt that ruin was ahead of me. I had paid 
out considerable sums of money, debts were accumu- 
lating and, far from decreasing, Juliette’s whims be- 
came even more numerous and more expensive: money 
flowed like water from her hands, like a fountain, in one 
continuous stream. “She evidently thinks me richer 


168 CALVARY 


than I am,” I thought to myself, in an effort to deceive 
myself. “I ought to warn her, perhaps show myself 
a little more reserved in yielding to her desires.” The 
truth was that I deliberately dismissed from my mind 
every notion of this kind, that I dreaded the probable 
consequences of such a challenge even more than the 
greatest possible misfortune in the world. 

In my rare moments of clear-mindedness, of frank- 
ness with myself, I understood that beneath her air 
of sweetness, beneath her naiveté of a spoiled child, 
beneath the robust and vibrant passions of her flesh 
Juliette concealed a powerful desire to be always beau- 
tiful, adored, paid court to, concealed a fierce selfish- 
ness which would not flinch before any cruelty, be- 
fore any moral crime! ...I realized that she loved 
me less than the last piece of cloth, that she would 
have sacrificed me for a cloak or a cravat or a pair of 
gloves. ... Once drawn into such a life she could 
not stop.... And then what?... Cold shivers 
passed up and down my frame from head to heels. . . 
That she should leave me, no, no, that I did not want! 

The most painful moment to me was in the morning 
when I woke up. With eyes closed, pulling the cover 
over my head, my body huddled up into a ball, I used 
to ponder over my situation with terrible anguish. 
And the more faulty she appeared to me, the more 
desperately I clung to Juliette. No matter how often 
I said to myself that my money would soon be gone, 
that the credit on which I could dishonestly prolong 
the agony of hope against hope for another week or 
two, would eventually be denied to me; I clung to 
the present and rabidly evolved all sorts of impossible 
plans. I pictured myself accomplishing superhuman 
tasks in the course of one week. I dreamed of finding 
millions in some hackney coach, Fabulous inheritances 


CALVARY 169 


dropped down from the skies for me. The idea of 
stealing haunted me.... 

Gradually all these insane notions took hold of my 
distracted mind. I was presenting Juliette with pal- 
aces and castles; I overwhelmed her with diamonds 
and pearls; gold streamed and glittered all around 
her, and I raised her high above the earth, upon dizzy, 
royal heights. Then the sense of reality would sud- 
denly return. I buried myself deeper in the bed. I 
sought realms of non-existence in whose depth I could 
disappear. I forced myself to sleep. And suddenly, 
out of breath, with sweat on my forehead and a 
haggard look in my eyes, I would snuggle up to Juliette, 
press her in my arms with all my strength, sobbing: 

“You'll never leave me, will you, my Juliette! Tell 
me, tell me that you’ll never leave me. Because, you 
see... . I'll die. . . if you do—T'll go crazy. I'll kill 
myself! Juliette,-I swear to you that I'll kill my- 
self!” 

“Why, what has come over you? Why do you 
tremble so? No, my dear, I’ll never leave you. Are 
we not happy together? Besides, I love you so much! 
When you are nice as you are now!” 

“Yes, yes! [ll kill myself! [’ll kill myself!” 

“You are so funny, my dear! Why do you tell me 
that?” 

“ Because.” 

I was going to tell her everything. .. . But I had 
not the courage. And I said: 

“Because I love you! Because I don’t want you 
to leave me! Because I don’t want to.” 

Nevertheless I finally had to bring this matter to a 
head. Juliette had seen in the window of a jewelry 
store on the Rue de la Paix, a string of pearls of which 
she spoke without end. One day when we were in 
that neighborhood: 


170 CALVARY 


“ Let’s go and see that beautiful jewel,” she said to 
me. 

With her nose pressed against the window pane and 
eyes shining, she looked at the string arranged in a 
triple circular row of pink pearls upon the velvet of 
the jewel case. I saw a tremor passing up and down 
her skin. 

“Tsn’t that beautiful? And it isn’t expensive at all! 
I have asked about the price... fifty thousand 
francs. ... That’s an exceptional bargain.” 

I tried to draw her further on. But coaxingly, 
hanging on my arm, she held me back. And she sighed: 

“ Ah, how nice that would look on the neck of your 
little wifie!” 

She added with an air of profound grief: 

“ Really! All the women have lots of jewels. Only 
I have none. If you were really nice, really kind to 
me, you would give them to your poor little Juliette. 
... There now!” 

I stammered out: 

“Certainly. I want to—very much... but later 

. next week!” 

Juliette’s face grew dark: 

“Why next week? Can’t you do it now, right now!” 

“Well you see... now. ..I am short of money. 

.. Lama little hard up.” 

“What? Already? You haven’t got a sou? Is that 
a fact? Where did all your money go? Yiou have not 
a sou left?” 

“Why yes, I have! Only I am a little short of cash 
temporarily.” 

“Well if that’s the case it doesn’t matter. I have 
also made inquiries about the terms. They would 
agree to accept promissory notes. Five notes of six 
thousand francs each. That is not such a mighty 
matter!” 


CALVARY 171 


“Undoubtedly. But a little later! I promise you. 
Is that all right?” 

“Ah!” Juliette said simply. 

I looked at her, the wrinkle on her forehead terrified 
me; I saw a hidden glimmer flare up in her eyes, and 
in the space of a second a world of extraordinary 
sensations hitherto unknown to me, took hold of me. 
Very clearly, with perfect understanding, with cruel 
indifference, with a startling conciseness of judgment 
I put the following question to myself: “ Juliette and 
dishonor; Juliette and prison?” I did not hesitate. 

“ Let’s go in,” I said. 

She took the string of pearls away with her. 

In the evening, wearing her pearls, she sat down 
on my lap, radiant, with her arms closed around my 
neck. She sat so for a long time, lulling me with her 
sweet voice. 

“ Ah, my poor sweetie,” she said, “ I am not always 
sensible! Yes, I realize. I am a little foolish some- 
times. But I am through now! I want to be a good, 
a serious-minded woman. And you shall work un- 
disturbed, you'll write a good novel—a nice play. 
Then we shall be rich, very rich. And then if you 
should happen to be very much short of money we could 
sell this beautiful string of pearls! Because jewels 
are not like dresses, they are just as good as money. 
Press me in your arms strongly.” 

Ah! how fast that night was gone! How the hours 
sped by, no doubt frightened to hear love shrieking 
with a horrible voice of one who is damned. 

Disasters followed one another and soon reached 
their climax. The promissory notes that I had given 
Juliette’s jeweler remained unpaid. I had a hard time 
borrowing enough money to satisfy our everyday 
needs. My father had left some uncollected debts at 
Saint-Michel. Generous and kind-hearted, he liked 


172 CALVARY 


to help out small farmers in a pinch. Pitilessly I 
started the process servers after these poor devils, 
causing them to sell their hovels, their piece of land, 
the things with the aid of which they made a miser- 
able living, depriving themselves of everything. In 
the shops where I still had credit I bought things 
which I immediately resold at a very low price. I 
stooped to putting through the most questionable 
deals. My brains teemed with original plans of black- 
mail, and I tired Jesselin with my endless requests of 
money. Finally one day I went to see Lirat. I needed 
five hundred francs that evening, and I went to Lirat, 
deliberately, boldly! In his presence, however, in that 
studio full of painful memories, my self-assurance 
deserted me and I felt a sense of belated shame. I was 
with Lirat a quarter of an hour, without venturing 
to explain to him the thing that I expected of his 
friendship. . . . Of his friendship! . . . At last I made 
up my mind to go. 

“Well, good bye, Lirat!” 

“ Good bye, my friend.” 

“Ah! I forgot. Could you lend me five hundred 
francs? I am expecting my farm rents. They are 
overdue.” 

And I added rapidly: 

“Tl give them back to you tomorrow — tomorrow 
morning.” 

Lirat fixed his glance on me for a moment. I can 
still see that glance. It was truly sorrowful. 

“Five hundred francs!” he said. ‘“ Where in the 
devil do you expect me to get them? Have I ever 
had five hundred francs?” 

I insisted, repeating: 

“T’ll give them back to you tomorrow. . . tomorrow 
morning.” 

“But I haven’t got them, my poor Mintié. I have 


CALVARY 173 


only two hundred francs left. Would that do you 
any good?” 

I was thinking that these two hundred francs which 
he offered meant to him a whole month’s subsistence. 
I answered with a bleeding heart: 

“ Well, all right! All the same! I’ll give them back 
to you tomorrow. . . tomorrow morning.” 

“ That is all right!” 

At that moment I would have wished to throw my- 
self on Lirat’s neck, to beg his pardon, to shout: “ No, 
no I don’t want this money!” And like a thief I took 
it away with me. 


CHAPTER VII 


VM properties, the Priory itself, the old familiar 


house mortgaged several times, were sold! 
... Ah! the sad journey which I made on 
that occasion! ...It was a long time since I had 
been to Saint-Michel! And yet in my hours of disgust 
and weariness, in the evil excitement of Paris, the 
thought of this peaceful little place was sweet and 
calming. The pure wafts of air which came to me from 
there had a refreshing effect upon my congested brains, 
they soothed my heart burned by the corrosive acids 
which are carried along by the infected air of cities, 
and I often promised myself that whenever I got tired 
of always chasing dreams, I would seek refuge there 
amid the peace and serenity of native objects... . 
Saint-Michel! ... Never was the place so dear to 
me as after I had left it; it seemed to me that it con- 
tained riches and beauty such as I had never known 
how to enjoy and which I now suddenly discovered... 
I loved to direct my memories there, best of all I 
loved to recall the forest, the beautiful forest where, as 
a restless, dreamy child, I had lost my way so many 
times. . . . Inhaling with keen delight the aroma of 
the rich sap of trees, the ear enchanted by the har- 
monies of the wind which caused the underwood and 
forest trees to vibrate like harps and violin cellos, I 
lost myself in the large alleys overhung with trembling 
foliage, large, straight alleys which far, far away ended 
abruptly and opened up like a church bay upon the 
light of a pane of sky, arched and luminous... . 
In these dreams I saw the branches of oak trees 
reach out their foliage greener than ever, happy to 


CALVARY 175 


find me again; young staddles greeted me with a 
joyous rustle as I passed by; they seemed to say to 
me: “ Look how big we grew, how smooth and strong 
our trunks are, how good the air in which we spread 
out our slender, swaying boughs, how bountiful the 
soil in which we sink our roots always full of life — 
giving sap.” The moss and peat mould called me: 
“We have prepared a nice bed for you, little fellow, 
a nice fragrant little bed such as you won’t find in 
the miserably gilded houses of the big cities. ... 
Stretch yourself out, roll on it if you are too warm, 
the fern will sway its gentle fans over your head, 
the beech trees will spread their branches open to 
let through a sunbeam which will gladden your heart.” 
Alas! ever since I fell in love with Juliette — these 
voices have gradually become silent. These memories 
no longer came back like guardian angels to lull me 
to sleep and to gently stir their white wings in the 
agitated azure of my dreams! ... My past had be- 
come estranged from me, ashamed of me!... 

The train sped on; it had cleared the plains of 
Beauce, even more melancholy to look at than in the 
grim days of the war. . . . And I recognized the small, 
humpy fields, their hedges of brushwood, the scattered 
apple trees, the narrow valleys, the poplars with their 
tops bent in the shape of hoods, which in the fields 
resembled a strange procession of blue penitents, the 
farms with high mossgrown roofs, highways deep cut 
and rough, bordered with girdled trees, which slanted 
down in the midst of sturdy verdure, the woods down 
yonder, black against the setting sun....It was 
getting dark when I arrived at Saint-Michel. I liked 
it better so. . . . To cross the streets in full daylight, 
under the gaze of all these excellent people who had 
known me asa child, would have been too painful for 
me. ... It seemed to me that I was laden with so 


176 CALVARY 


much shame that they would turn away from me with 
horror as from a mangy dog....I1 quickened my 
pace, rolling up the collar of my overcoat.... The 
grocery owner, named Madame Henriette, who in the 
past used to stuff me with cake, was standing in front 
of her store and talking to her neighbors. ... I was 
afraid they might be talking about me and, leaving the 
sidewalk I took to the roadway. ... Fortunately a 
cart passed by, the noise of which drowned the words 
of these women: The Presbytery. . . the Convent of 
the Sisters... the church... the Priory!... At 
this hour the Priory was nothing but a huge black 
mass in the sky. ... My heart failed me... . I had 
to lean against one of the posts of the gate to catch 
my breath.... A few steps away the forest mur- 
mured, its dull voice growing in amplitude, angry, like 
the raging roar of breakers... . 

Marie and Felix were waiting for me. ... Marie 
older and more wrinkled, Felix, more stooping and 
shaking his head more than ever... . 

“Ah! Monsieur Jean! ... Monsieur Jean! .. .” 
And forthwith taking possession of my valise, Marie 
said: 

“You ought to be pretty hungry by this time, 
Monsieur Jean! ... I have some soup for you, the 
kind you used to like, and then I have put a nice 
chicken on the spit.” 

“Thank you!” I said. “I shall not dine.” 

I would have liked to embrace both of them, to 
open my arms for them, to cry upon their old, parched 
faces. . . And instead! my voice was harsh, trenchant. 
I uttered “I shall not dine ” in the manner of a threat. 
They looked at me somewhat frightened, but never 
stopped repeating: 

“Ah! Monsieur Jean! ... It has been such a long 


CALVARY 177 


time! ... Ah! Monsieur Jean! ... What a hand- 
some young man you are!.. .” 

Then Marie, thinking that she would gain my in- 
terest thereby, began telling me the news of the place: 

“That poor Monsieur the curé is dead, you know. 
The new one in his place don’t seem to be getting 
ahead at all, he is too young and anxious. . . . Bap- 
tiste has been crushed to death by a tree.” 

I interrupted her: 

“All right, all right, Marie. . . . You'll tell me about 
it tomorrow.” 

She took me to my bedroom and asked: 

“ Shall I bring you a bowl of milk, Monsieur Jean?” 

“Tf you please!” 

And closing the door, I flung myself on the lounge 
and sobbed for a long, long time. 

The next day I got up at dawn. . . . The Priory had 
not changed much: there was only more grass in the 
alleys, more moss on the steps, and a few trees were 
dead. Again I saw the gate, the scurfy lawn, the puny 
looking sorbs, the aged chestnut trees. Again I saw 
the basin where the little kitten had been shot, the 
curtain of fir trees which hid the commons from view, 
the abandoned study; I saw the park, its twisted trees 
and stone benches that looked like ancient tombs. .. . 
In the kitchen garden Felix was digging a border bed 
for flowers. ... Ah! poor man, how battered his 
frame was! 

He showed me a hawthorn and said: 

“That is where you used to come with your poor 
deceased father to lie in wait for the blackbirds. . . . 
Do you remember, Monsieur Jean?” 

“Yes, yes, Felix!” 

“ And also the thrush?” 

“Yes, yes, Felix!” 

I walked away. I could not bear the sight of this 


178 CALVARY 


old man any longer, this man who thought he was 

going to live to the end of his days at the Priory and 

whom I was about to drive out. . . and where was 

he to go? . . . He had served us faithfully, he was al- 

most one of our family, poor, unable to gain a liveli- 

hood otherwise. And I was going to chase him out! 
. Ah! How could I bring myself to do that? 

At breakfast Marie seemed nervous. She walked 
around my chair, unusually excited. 

“Beg pardon!” she said to me at last, “I must 
clear up all my doubts about this matter... . Is it 
true that you are selling the Priory? .. .” 

“Yes, Marie.” 

The old woman opened wide her eyes, stupefied, 
and, placing her hands on the table, repeated: 

“You are selling the Priory?” 

“Yes, Marie.” 

“The Priory where all your-family was born? ... 
The Priory where your father and your mother died? 

. The Priory, Holy Jesus!” 

ys ‘Yes, Marie.” 

She recoiled as if frightened. 

“Then you are a wicked son, Monsieur Jean!” 

I made no reply. Marie left the dining room and 
did not speak to me any more. 

Two days later, my business having been attended 
to, the deed signed, I left. .. . My money was hardly 
enough to last me a month. . . . I was done for! Over- 
whelming debts, ignoble debts was all that was left 
to me! ... Ah! if the train could only carry me on 
and on, always further on, never to arrive anywhere! 

. It was only in Paris that I reminded myself that 
I had not even gone to kneel down at the grave of 
my father and mother. 

Juliette received me tenderly. She embraced me 
passionately. 


CALVARY 179 


“Ah! dear, dear! ... I thought you would hever 
come back! . . . Five days, just think of it! .. . Next 
time if you have to go again I want to go with you.” 

She appeared so affectionate, so truly moved, her 
caresses gave me such confidence, and then the burden 
on my soul was so heavy, that I did not hesitate to 
tell her everything. I took her in my arms and put 
her on my lap. 

“Listen to me, my Juliette,” I said to her, ‘listen 
to me!...I am lost... ruined. .. ruined. . . do 
you hear, ruined! ... We have only four thousand 
francs left! .. .” 

“Poor boy!” Juliette sighed while placing her head 
on my shoulder, “poor boy! .. .” 

I burst out sobbing, and cried out: 

“You understand now that I must leave you... . 
And I am going to die if I do!” 

“Come now, you are silly to talk that way. ... 
Do you believe I could live without you, my dear?... 
Come now, don’t cry, don’t grieve so much... .” 

She dried the tears from my eyes and continued in 
her voice which grew sweeter with every word. 

“First of all we have four thousand francs... . 
We can live four months on that. . . . During these 
four months you'll work. . . . Let us see if you can’t 
write a good novel in four months! . . . But don’t cry, 
because if you cry, I won’t tell you a great secret. . . 
a great, great secret... . Do you know what your 
little wifie did, who little suspected that herself — do 
you know? ... Well, for three days she went to the 
riding school, she took lessons in horsemanship — and 
next year when she is well trained, Franconi will 
engage her... . Do you know what.a woman rider 
in a fashionable riding school makes. . . . Two thou- 
sand, three thousand francs a month! ... You see 


180 CALVARY 


now, there isn’t much to grieve over, my poor little 
boy!” 

All nonsense, all folly seemed logical to me. I clung 
to it desperately as a shipwrecked sailor clings to the 
insecure wreckage tossed by the waves. Provided it 
kept me afloat for an instant, I did not care toward 
what dangerous reefs, toward what blacker depths it 
swept me on. I also cleaved to that absurd hope of 
one doomed to perish, which even on the slaughter 
stake, which even under the knife, still expects the 
impossible to happen: a sudden change, an earthly 
catastrophe which will deliver him from death. I per- 
mitted myself to be deluded by the pretty purring of 
Juliette’s words! A firm resolve to work heroically 
filled my spirit and threw me into raptures. . . . I had 
visions of multitudes of people bending breathlessly 
over my books, of theatres where grave and painted 
men were coming forward and uttering my name to 
the boundless enthusiasm of the audience. Overcome 
with fatigue, worn out with emotion, I fell asleep. 

We finished dinner. Juliette was even more affec- 
tionate than at the time when I came back. Neverthe- 
less, I noticed a sort of uneasiness, a preoccupied air in 
her. She was sad and gay at one and the same time: 
What was going on behind this forehead over which 
clouds were passing? Did she decide to leave me, in 
spite of all her protestations, and did she want to make 
our separation easier by lavishing on me all the treas- 
ures of her caresses? 

“How annoying, my dear!” she said, “I have to 
go out.” 

“What do you mean, you have to go out? Now?” 

“Why yes, just think of it. That poor Gabrielle is 
very ill. She is alone —I have promised to come to 
see her! Oh! but I won’t stay very long. .. . About 
an hour... .” 


CALVARY 181 


Juliette spoke very naturally. But I don’t know 
why, it seemed to me that she was lying, that she was 
not going to Gabrielle at all. And suspicion, vague, 
terrifying suspicion pierced my heart. I said to her: 

“Can’t you wait till tomorrow?” 

“Oh, that’s impossible! Don’t you understand, I 
have promised.” 

“ Please, do me a favor! Go tomorrow. ... 

“ That’s impossible! Poor Gabrielle!” 

“All right! ... Vl go with you. ... I'll wait for 
you at the door! .. .” 

Cunningly I studied her. . . . Her face was motion- 
less... . No, really her muscles did not betray the 
least surprise. She answered gently: 

“There is no sense in that! ... Youare tired.... 
Go to bed! .. .” 

And forthwith I saw the train of her gown stream 
behind the drawn door curtain like a snake... . 
Juliette is in her dressing room. ... And with eyes 
fixed upon the table cloth where the red reflection of a 
bottle of wine is flitting, I recall that recently some 
women came to this house, fleshly squint-eyed women, 
women who had the air of dogs scenting ordure. ... 
I remember I had asked Juliette who those women 
were. One time Juliette answered: “ That’s the corset 
maker.” Another time she said: “That’s the em- 
broiderer.” And I believed her! One day I picked up 
on the carpet a visiting card which read. . . . Madame 
Rabineau, 114 Rue de Séze. “ Who was this Mme. 
Rabineau?” Juliette answered: “ That’s nothing. . . 
give it here....” And she tore the card up.... 
And fool that I was, I did not even go to the Rue de 
Séze to find out! ... I recall all that... . Ah! how 
could I ever fail to understand? ... Why didn’t I 
seize them by the neck, these vile dealers in human 
flesh? ... 


” 


182 CALVARY 


And suddenly a great veil is lifted from my eyes, 
behind it I see Juliette with defiled body, exhausted 
and hideous, selling herself to human vultures! ... 
Juliette is there, putting on her gloves, in front of me, 
in a dark dress with a thick veil which hides her fea- 
tures. .. . The shadow of her hand dances upon the 
table cloth, lengthens out, grows broader, shrinks 
again, disappears and comes back again. . . . I shall 
always see this diabolic shadow, always! ... 

“ Kiss me, dearie!” 

“Don’t go out Juliette, don’t go out, I implore 


you!” 
“Embrace me. . . closer. . . closer yet. . . .” 
She is sad. . . . Through the thick veil I feel on my 


cheek the moisture of a tear. 
“Why do you cry, Juliette... . Juliette, for pity’s 
sake, stay with me!” 


“Embrace me. ...I adore you, my Jean.... I 
adore you! .. .” 

She is gone. . . . Doors open, close again. . . . She 
is gone. . . . Outside I hear the noise of a rolling car- 
riage. The noise grows fainter and fainter and dies 
gut. 2.4 She jis-gone lou... 

And here I, too, am on the street. . . . A cab passes 
by — 114, Rue de Séze! 

My mind was made up quickly. .. . I figured that 


I would come there before she could. ... She per- 
fectly understood that I was not taken in by that story 
of Gabrielle’s illness. ... My anxiety, my eagerness 
no doubt inspired her with the fear of being spied 
after, followed, and most likely she would not go to 
the place immediately. But why did just this abomin- 
able thought flash through my mind like lightning?... 
Why only this possibility and no other? ... I still 
hope that my presentiments have deceived me, that 


CALVARY 183 


Madame Rabineau “is nothing,’ that Gabrielle is 
really sick! 

Some kind of a small hotel hedged in between two 
tall buildings, a narrow door hollowed out in the wall 
at the end of three steps; a dark fagade, whose closed 
windows let no light penetrate. . .. It’s here! ... It 
is here she is going to come, where she already came 
perhaps! ... Rage drives me toward this door.... 
I should like to set this house on fire; I should like 
to make all those detestable ladies hidden there shriek 
and writhe in agony, in some hellish blaze. . . . Pres- 
ently a woman enters, singing and swaying her body, 
her hands in the pockets of her light jacket. . . . Why 
did not I spit in her face? . . . An old man has come 
out of his coupé. He passed close to me, snorting, 
panting, supported under his arm by his valet... . 
His trembling feet are unable to carry him, between 
his flabby, swollen eyelids there glimmers a light of 
beastly dissipation. ... Why did I not slash the 
hideous face of this profligate old faun? ... Perhaps 
he is waiting for Juliette! . . . The door of the Inferno 
opened before him—and for an instant my eyes 
plunged into the pits of hell. ...I1 thought I saw 
red flames, smoke, abominable embraces, the tumbling 
down of creatures horribly twisted together. . . . But 
no, it is only a gloomy deserted hallway, lit by the 
pale shine of a lamp; then at the end of it there is 
something black like a dark hole, where one feels im- 
pure things are stirring. . . . And carriages are stop- 
ping in front of the building, dumping out their haul 
of human dung into this sink of love. . . . A little girl 
barely ten years old follows me: “ Nice violets! Nice 
violets!”. ..I give her a gold piece. “Go away 
from here, little one, go away! .. . Don’t stay here. 
They will get you! .. .” 

My mind is over-exerted. A thousand-toothed sor- 


184 CALVARY 


row gnaws at my heart, a thousand claws sink into it, 
tears it to pieces in a frenzy of grief. . . . A desire to 
kill is kindled in me and makes my arms go through 
murderous motions. ... Ah, to rush, whip in hand, 
into the midst of this lustful crowd and lash their 
bodies until ineffaceable marks are left on them, cause 
their warm blood to spurt, and scatter pieces of their 
living flesh all over the mirrors, carpets, beds! ... 
And nail that Rabineau woman to the door of this 
house of ill-fame, like an owl on the doors of farm 
barns, nail her stripped, disemboweled, with her vitals 
out! ...A hackney coach has stopped: a woman 
steps out. I recognize the hat, the veil, the dress. 

“ Juliette!” 

On seeing me, she utters a cry.... But she re- 
gains her composure quickly. .. . Her eyes defy me. 

“ Leave me alone,” she cries out to me. “ What are 
you doing here? . . . Leave me alone!” 

I almost crush her wrists, and in a suffocating voice 
which rattles: 

“Listen now. ... If you make another step. ... 
if you say another word. . . I’ll knock you dead right 
here — on this sidewalk, and tramp you to death under 
my feet.” 

With a heavy blow I strike her in the face and with 
my nails I furiously claw her forehead and cheeks from 
which blood is gushing. 


“Jean! Oh! Jean! ... Have mercy, please! ... 
Jean, mercy; Mercy! ... Have pity on me!... You 
are killing me... .” 

Rudely I drag her toward the carriage. . . and we 
get in... . Huddled up in two, she sits there right 
close to me, sobbing. ... What am I going to do 
now? ...I1 don’t know. ... In truth I don’t know. 


I don’t ask myself any questions. I don’t think of any- 
thing. ... It seems as though a mountain of stone 


CALVARY 185 


has descended upon me... . I feel the heavy rocks 
on which my neck has crashed, against which my flesh 
has been bruised. . . . Why, with all the black des- 
pair in which I find myself, do these high walls rise 
up towards heaven? Why these dismal birds flying 
about in unexpected sunshine? . . . Why is this thing 
crouched down beside me crying?... Why?... 
I don’t know. ... 

I am going to kill her. . . . She is in her bedroom 
without lights, in bed. . . . Iam in the dressing room 
pacing up and down. . . I am walking back and forth 
with constrained breath, my head on fire, with clinched 
fists eager to inflict punishment. ...I am going to 
kill her! . . . From time to time I stop near the door 
and listen. .. . She is crying. ... And in a minute 
I will enter... .I will enter and pull her off the 
bed, drag her by the hair, knock her senseless, break 
her neck against the marble edges of the fireplace. .. . 
I want the room to be red with her blood. . . . I want 
to see her body beaten into lumps of battered flesh 
which I shall throw out with the rest of the rubbish 
and which the garbage man will take away tomorrow. 
... Cry, cry!...In a minute you'll howl, my 
dearest! ... Haven’t I been stupid! ... To think 
of everything but that! . . . To fear everything except 
that! .. . To say to myself: “she will leave me” and 
never, never: “she will deceive me. ...” To have 
failed to divine the nature of this den, this old man, 
all this filth! ... Really I had never thought of it 
before, blind fool that I was. She must have laughed 
when I implored her not to leave me! .. . To leave 
me. ... Ah! yes, to leave me! . . . She did not want 
to, of course. . . . Now I understand it. . . . I inspired 
her neither with probity of heart nor with decency 
of conduct; I was to her just a label, a trade mark. . . 
a mark of superior value! ... Yes, when they saw 


186 CALVARY 


her in my arms and therefore priced her more highly, 
she could sell herself for much more than she would 
have received if, like a nocturnal ghoul, she had 
roamed the sidewalks and haunted the obscene 
shadows of the streets. ... She had swallowed my 
fortune in one gulp. ... Her lips had rendered my 
mentality sterile at the first touch Now she is 
gambling with my honor, that is consistent. . . . With 
my honor! . . . How could she know that I had none 
left? . 3. 

But am I really going to kill her? . . . When one 
is dead, everything is forgotten! . . . One bares one’s 
head before the coffin of a criminal, one bows in sadness 





before the dead body of a prostitute....In the 
churches, believers kneel down and pray for those who 
have suffered, for those who have sinned. ... At the 


cemeteries reverence watches over the graves and the 
cross protects them. . . . To die is to be forgiven! . . 
Yes, death is beautiful, holy, noble! . . . Death is the 
beginning of the great eternal light. . . . Ah, to die! 
. . . to stretch oneself out on a mattress softer than 
the softest most in birds’ nests. . . . To think no more 
. .. To hear the noise of life no longer! . . . To feel 
the infinite sweetness of nothingness! ...To be a 
soul! ... 

I shall not kill her. . . . I shall not kill her because 
she has to suffer... terribly, always. ... Let her 
suffer in all her beauty, in all her pride, in her exposed 
carnality of a prostitute! ... I shall not kill her, but 
I shall disfigure her to such an extent, I shall make 
her look so repulsive that people, frightened, will flee 
at the sight of her... . And every evening I shall 
compel her to appear on the streets, at the theatre, 
everywhere with her nose crushed, her eyes bulging 
out from under eyelids fringed with black rings, with- 
out a veil! ... 


CALVARY 187 


Suddenly sobs from my throat... . I fling myself 
on the couch, biting the cushion, and cry andcry!... 
Minutes, hours pass and I am still crying! .. . Ah! 
Juliette, vile Juliette! ... Why did you do that? ... 
Why? ... Could you not say to me: “Here now, you 
are not rich any more and all I want of you is money. 
. . . Leave me!” That would have been cruel, it might 
have meant my death. ... But what of it?...It 
would have been better. ... How can I look into 
your face now? . .. How can our mouths ever touch 
each other? ... There is now between us the thick 
wall of that wicked place! ... Ah! Juliette! ... 
Wretched Juliette! ... 

I remember her going out. ... I recollect every- 


thing! . . . I recall how she was dressed in her gray 
dress, the shadow of her hand dancing strangely on 
the back of her neck. . . . I see her as clearly as if 


she were before me now, and even more so. .. . She 
was sad, she was crying. ...I am sure it was not 
mere imagination on my part... she was actually 
crying, for my cheek was wet with her tears! Whom 
was she crying over, me or herself? Ah! .. who 
knows? ...I1 remember. ... I said to her: “ Don’t 
go out, my Juliette! .. .” She replied: “ Embrace me 
closely, very closely, more closely yet! .. .” And her 
caresses had the passion of despair in them, a kind of 
shrivelling grip, a sort of fear as if she had wanted 
to cling to me, to seek tremblingly protection in my 
arms. . . . I can see her eyes, her beseeching look. . . 
They seemed to implore me: “ Something abominable 
is drawing me on. .. . Hold me back! . . . lamclose 
to your heart. . . do not let me go! . . . And instead 
of taking her in my arms, carrying her away, hiding 
her and loving her so as to make her giddy with hap- 
piness, I opened up my arms and let her go! . . . She 
sought refuge in my love, and I denied it to her. . . 


188 CALVARY 


She cried to me: “I adore you, I adore you!...’ 
And I stood there like a fool, amazed as is a child 
at the unexpected flapping of the wings of a captive 
bird that has just escaped. . . . I did not understand 
that sadness, those tears, those caresses, those words 
more tender than usual, that trembling. . . . It is only 
now that I hear those silent, melancholy words: “ My 
dear Jean, I am a poor little woman, a little foolish 


and so weak! ... I had no idea of anything big or 
worth while. . .. Who was there to teach me what 
chastity, duty, virtue meant! . . . When I was a child 


yet, evil surroundings contaminated me, and vice was 
taught to me by the very people who were supposed to 
be my guardians. .. Still I am not wicked and I 
love you. ...I1 love you more than I ever loved 
you! ... My beloved Jean, you are strong, you know 
many beautiful things which I don’t... . Well, pro- 
tect me!... An overpowering desire draws me 
there. ... The trouble is I have seen too much 
jewelry, too many gowns and other exquisite and ex- 
pensive trifles which you can’t buy me any longer but 
which others have promised to get me! . . . I have an 
instinctive feeling that it’s wrong and that it will 
cause you suffering. . . . Well, subdue me! .. . I ask 
for no other chance than to be good and virtuous. .. . 
Teach me how! ... Beat me... . if I resist! .. .” 
Poor Juliette! . . . It seems to me that she is down 
on her knees before me, with clasped hands. ... 
Tears are rolling from her eyes, from her big eyes 
downcast and sweet. . . . Tears are streaming from her 
eyes endlessly as they used to stream from the eyes 
of my mother in the past. ... And at the thought 
that I wanted to kill her, that I wanted to disfigure 
her delightful and sorrowful face through horrible 
mutilation, I am seized with remorse and my wrath 
gives way to pity.... She goes on.... “Forgive 


CALVARY 189 


me! ... Oh! my Jean you must forgive me... . It 
is not my fault, I assure you. .. . Try to recall... . 
Did you ever warn me, even once? .. . Did you ever 


show me even once the way which I should follow? 
Through weakness, through fear of losing me, through 
excessive and criminal kindness, you have yielded to 
all my whims, even the most wicked ones. . . . How 
could I know that it was wrong, when you have never 
told me anything? ... Instead of stopping me on 
the brink of the precipice where I was headed, you 
yourself have pushed me into it... . What example 
have you placed before my eyes? ... Whither have 
you led me? . . . Have you ever tried to take me out 
of this alarming atmosphere of debauchery? .. . Why 
didn’t you chase Jesselin or Gabrielle out of our house, 
all those degenerates whose very presence only helped 
to increase my wickedness? ... To breathe into me 
a particle of your own soul, to send a ray of light 
into the darkness of my brains—that is what you 


should have done! ... Yes, you should have given 
me another life, you should have made me over 
again! ...Iam guilty, my Jean! ...And I am so 


ashamed of myself that I can never hope_to be able 
to atone for the infamy of this evil hour even with a 
whole life of sacrifice and repentance. . .. But you! 
. .. Is your conscience satisfied that you have done 
your duty? ... I dread not the expiation of my sins. 
. . . On the contrary I welcome it, I want it... . But 
you? ... Can you sit in judgment over a crime which 
‘I admit I have committed, but in which you, too, have 
had a part since you have not done anything to pre- 
vent it! . . . My dear beloved, listen to me. . . . This 
body which I have attempted to defile horrifies you; 
hereafter you will not be able to look at it without 
rage and anguish. . . . All right then, let it perish! ... 
Let it rot in the oblivion of a graveyard! . . . There 


190 CALVARY 
shall be left to you my soul, it belongs to you, for it 


has never forsaken you, for it loves you. . . . See how 
white and pure it is... .” 

A knife glistens in Juliette’s hands. . . . She is going 
to kill herself with it. . . . I grasp her arms, I shout: 
“No, no, Juliette, no, I don’t want you to! ... I love 
you! ...No, no. ... I don’t want you to!” 


My arms are brought together in an embrace, but I 
enclose nothing but space....I look around me, 
frightened, the place is empty! ... I look again... . 
The gas is burning with a yellow flame over the 
dressing table. . . rumpled skirts are strewn all over 
the carpet... shoes lie scattered about.... And 
pale daylight is stealing into the room through the 
open spaces in the shutters. ...I1 begin to fear in 
earnest that Juliette may kill herself, for otherwise 
why should this vision arise before me? . . . On tip- 
toe, quietly I walk toward the door and listen. ...A 
feeble sigh reaches my ear, then a wailing, then a sob. 
. . . And like a fool I rush into the room. . . . A voice 
speaks to me in the darkness, the voice of Juliette: 

“ Ah! my Jean! My dear little Jean!” 

And chastely, as Christ kissed Magdalene, I kissed 
her on the forehead. 


CHAPTER VIII 


x IRAT! Ah, at last it is you! For a week I have 
( been looking for you, have been writing to 
you, have been calling you, have been wait- 
ing for you... . Lirat, my dear Lirat, save me!” 

“What? My God! What’s wrong?” 

“T want to kill myself.” 

“ Kill yourself! Well, that’s an old story. Come, 
there is no danger.” 

“JT want to kill myself! I want to kill myself! .. .” 

Lirat looked at me, blinked his eyes and paced up 
and down the study with long strides. 

“My poor Mintié!” he said, “if you were a states- 
man, a stockbroker or. ... Well, I don’t know... 
say a grocer, an art critic, or a journalist, I would say 
to you: ‘ You are unhappy and you have had enough 
of life, my boy! Go ahead, kill yourself!’ And with 
these words I would leave you. But here you have 
that rare opportunity of being an artist, you possess 
that divine gift of seeing, understanding, feeling things 
which others can’t see, can’t understand and can’t feel! 
There are harmonies in nature which exist only for 
you and which others will never hear. . . you have 
all the real joys of life, the only joys, the noble, grand 
and pure ones, the joys which make you forget men 
and which render you almost Godlike. And because 
some woman has deceived you, you want to renounce 
all that? She has deceived you; it is evident that she 
has deceived you. . . . Well, what else did you expect 
her to do? And what concern is it of yours, even if 
she has? .. .” 

“ Please don’t jeer at me. You don’t know anything, 


192 CALVARY 


Lirat. You don’t suspect anything. I am lost, dis- 
honored!” 

“ Dishonored, my friend? Are you sure of it? Do 
you have unclean debts? You'll pay them off!” 

“Tt is not a question of that! I am dishonored! 
dishonored, do you understand? It has been four 
months since I have given Juliette any money... 
four months! And here I live, I eat, have my amuse- 
ments. Every evening. .. before dinner. . . late at 
night. . . . Juliette re-enters the house. She is worn- 
out, pale, her hair disheveled. From what dens, what 
alcoves, what arms is she returning? Upon what 
pillows has her head reclined! Sometimes I see pieces 
of bed clothes insolently hanging on the top of her 
hair. . . . She no longer feels ashamed of it, she does 
not even take the trouble to lie about it. . . one might 
think it had been arranged between us. She un- 
dresses, and I believe she takes a perverse delight 
in showing me her ill-fastened skirts, her unlaced cor- 
set, all the disorder of her rumpled clothes, of her 
loosened garments which come off, falling to the 
ground about her, and lie conspicuously on the floor, 
filling the bedroom with the breath of other people! 

“T tremble with rage and want to sink my teeth 
into her body; my wrath is kindled to a frenzy and 
boils within me—TI feel like killing her. And I say 
nothing! Often I even come up to her to embrace 
her. . . but she pushes me away: ‘ No, leave me alone, 
I am tired!’ At first, when this abominable life started, 
I used to beat her. . . for you must know, Lirat, there 
isn’t a disgraceful act that I have not committed. I have 
exhausted every form of indecency — yes, I beat her! 
She bent her back. . . and hardly uttered a complaint. 
One evening I seized her by the throat, I threw her to 
the ground. Oh! I had quite made up my mind to finish 
her. While I was strangling her, I turned my head 


CALVARY 193 


away for fear that I might be moved to pity, fixed 
my gaze upon a flower design on the carpet, and in or- 
der to hear nothing, neither her wailing nor rattling, I 
shrieked out inarticulate words, like a possessed one. 
How long did it last? Soon she ceased struggling. . . 


her muscles relaxed....I1 felt her vitality giving 
out under my fingers. . . a few more convulsions. . . 
and that was the end. . . She did not stir any more. 


And suddenly I saw her black-blue face, her contracted 
eyes, her mouth, large and wide open, her rigid body, 
her motionless arms. And like a madman I rushed 
into every room of the apartment, calling the servants: 
“Help, help, I have killed Madame! I have killed 
Madame! ” 

“T fled, tumbling down the stairway, without a hat, 
dashed into the caretakers: ‘Go upstairs quickly, I 
have killed Madame!’ Then I darted out on the street, 
in a frenzy. The whole night I was running without 
knowing whither, rushing along the boulevards, cross- 
ing bridges, dashing against benches in the parks and 
mechanically turning back toward the house. It seemed 
to me that through its closed shutters there penetrated 
the light of wax tapers; priests’ vestments, surplices, 
eucharists passed before me in confusion; it seemed 
to me that I could hear funeral chants, the rumble of 
organs, the noise of ropes rubbing against the wood 
of the coffin. I pictured Juliette stretched out on the 
bed, dressed in a white robe, her hands clasped, a 
crucifix on her breast and flowers about her. And I 
was surprised not to see black draperies on the door, 
or a hearse with flowers and wreaths at the entrance 
outside, or people in mourning fighting for a chance 
to be sprinkled with holy water. 

“Oh, Lirat, what a night that was! How did I 
ever manage not to throw myself under the wheels of 
the carriages, crash my head against the housewall, 


194 CALVARY 


or plunge into the Seine. I don’t know! ... Day 
came. ... 1 had a notion to surrender to the police. 
I wanted to go up to a policeman on the street and 
say to him: ‘I have killed Juliette. ... Arrest me!’ 
But thoughts, each wilder than the other, came to my 
mind, clashed and yielded to others. And I ran and 
ran as if pursued by a pack of barking hounds... . 
It was Sunday, | remember. There were many people 
on the streets flooded with sunshine. I was sure that 
all looked at me, that these people, seeing me run, 
cried out in horror: ‘ Here is Juliette’s murderer!’ 
“Toward evening, worn out, on the verge of col- 
lapsing on the sidewalk, I met Jesselin! ‘I say,’ he 
exclaimed, ‘you have done a nice thing, you have!’ 
‘Do you already know it?’ ‘ Why, all Paris knows it, 
dear friend. A little while ago, at the races, Juliette 
showed us her neck and the marks which your fingers 
had left on it. She said: “Jean did this to me.” Why, 
man you are getting on fine!’ And while parting, he 
added: ‘ For the rest, she has never been more beau- 
tiful. And such a success!’ And so you see that while 
I believed her to be dead, she was promenading at 
the racetrack. I had left the house and she could 
have thought that I would never come back again, and 
yet she went to the races. . . prettier than ever!” 
Lirat gravely listened to me. He was not pacing 
about any more; he seated himself and shook his head. 
“What do you want me to tell you? You must go 
away.” 
“Go away?” I rejoined. “I should go away? But 
I don’t want to! An adhesive force like glue which is 
getting thicker every day holds me fast to her carpets, 
a chain growing heavier every day holds me riveted 
to her walls. I can’t leave her! Look, at this very 
moment I am dreaming of committing all sorts of 
mad, heroic acts. To cleanse myself of all this base- 


CALVARY 195 


ness, I am ready to throw myself in front of the fire- 
spitting muzzles of a hundred cannons. I feel myself 
strong enough to crush whole formidable armies single 
handed. When I walk on the street I look for run- 
away horses, fires or any other dangerous adventure 
where I can sacrifice my life. There is not a perilous 
or superhuman deed that I have not the courage to 
perform. But, that! I can not do! 

“At first I offered myself the most ridiculous ex- 
cuses, I gave myself the most illogical reasons for not 
leaving her. I said to myself that if I left her, Juliette 
would sink to even lower depths; that my love for her 
had in some manner been her last vestige of decency 
which I should finally succeed in restoring by saving 
her from the mire in which she wallowed. Truly I 
had been repaid by the luxury of pity and self sacrifice. 
But I was lying! I simply can’t leave her! I can’t 
because I love her, because the more depraved she is 
the more I love her. Because I want her, do you hear, 
Lirat? And if you only knew what it means to me, 
this love, what frenzies, what shame, what tortures? 
If you only knew to what depths of Hell passion can 
sink, you would be horrified! At night when she is 
asleep, I prowl about in her dressing room, opening 
drawers, digging among the cinders of the fire place, 
putting together pieces of torn letters, smelling the 
linens which she has just removed, devoting myself to 
the vilest spying, to the most shameful searching! It 
was not enough for me to know; I had to see as well! 
I have no longer a mind, a heart, or anything. I am 
just the embodiment of disordered, raving, famished 
sex, which demands its share of living flesh, like the 
fallow-deer that howl in their frenzy on rutting nights.” 

I was exhausted. . . the words came out of my 
throat with a hissing sound. . . still I continued. 

“Ah! It is beyond all comprehension! Sometimes it 


196 CALVARY 


happens that Juliette is sick. Her members, over- 
strained by pleasure, refuse to obey her; her constitu- 
tion, worn out by nervous shocks, revolts. She takes 
to her bed. If you could only see her then? A child, 
Lirat, a sweet and touching child! She dreams only 
of the country, little brooks, green prairies, simple 
joys: ‘ Oh, my dear, she exclaims, ‘ with ten thousand 
francs of income, how happy we should be!’ She 
makes all sorts of Virgilian and charming plans. ‘ We 
ought to go far, far away, to live in a house surrounded 
by tall trees. She will raise chickens which will lay 
eggs she herself will take out of the hatching place 
every morning; she will make cream, cheese; and she 
will wear aprons like this and straw hats like that, 
jogging along pathways astride a donkey that she 
will call Joseph. Geeho! Joseph, Geeho! Ah, how nice 
it will be!’ 

“When I hear her say that, I feel hope returning and 
I let myself be taken in by that impossible dream of 
a rustic life with Juliette disguised as a shepherdess. 
Quiet landscapes like places of refuge, enchanting 
like a paradise, unroll before us. ... and we grow 
exalted and enthusiastic. Juliette cries: ‘My poor 
little thing, I have caused you suffering, but now it’s 
all over. I promise you. And then I am going to 
have a trained ram, am I not? A beautiful ram, very 
big, all white, around whom I shall tie a bow of red 
ribbon, and who will follow me everywhere together 
with Spy, not so, dear?’ She insists that I have 
my dinner in front of her bed, on a little table, and she 
coddles me like a nurse and caresses me like a mother; 
she makes me eat as one does a child, repeating with- 
out end and with agitation in her voice: ‘My poor 
little thing!’ 

“At other moments she becomes thoughtful and 
grave: ‘My dear, I would like to ask you something 


CALVARY 197 


that has been worrying me for a long time; promise 
that you'll tell me.’ I promise. ‘ Well, when one is 
dead, in the coffin, is it true that one’s feet rest against 
the board?’ ‘ What an idea! Why do you speak of 
it?’ ‘Tell me, please tell me!’ ‘But I don’t know, 
my dear Juliette!’ ‘Don’t you know? Although it 
is true that you never know anything when I am se- 
rious. . . because... you see? ... I don’t want my 
feet to rest against the board. When I am dead... 
you shall put a cushion inside and my white dress. . . 
you know the one with pink flowers. . . the dress 
for which I won the first prize! You’ll be very sorry, 
my poor little thing, won’t you? Embrace me! Come 
over here, closer to me, still closer. I adore you!’ 

“ And I used to wish that Juliette were sick all the 
time! But as soon as she recovers she does not re- 
member anything; her promises, her resolutions are 
gone and our life of hell begins again, more violent 
and exasperating than ever. And from that little bit 
of heaven to which IJ have held on for a while, I tumble 
down again into the filth and crime of this love even 
more frightfully maimed in spirit! Ah! that is not 
all, Lirat! I should have stayed in that apartment to 
brood over my shame, don’t you think! I should have 
withdrawn into obscurity and oblivion sufficient to 
make people believe that I am dead. And instead of 
that! Well! Go to the Bois and you see me there every 
day. At the theatre it is I whom you will find in the 
stage box, in a dress suit, with a flower in my button- 
hole, always I! Juliette is resplendent amidst flowers, 
plumes and gems. She is exquisite, she has a new 
dress which everyone admires, a stock of smiles each 
more modest than the other, and the string of pearls 
for which I have not paid, which she toys gracefully 
with the tips of her fingers and without the least re- 
morse. And here I have not a sou, not a sou! And I 


198 CALVARY 


am at the end of my rope, having exhausted all my 
swindling tricks and crooked schemes! Often I 
tremble. It seems to me that the heavy hand of a 
gendarme is bearing down upon me. Already I hear 
the painful whisper, I catch the stealthy looks of con- 
tempt. 

“Little by little emptiness broadens and recedes 
all around me as around a pestiferous person. Old 
friends pass by, turn their heads away, avoid me in 
order not to greet me. . .. And unwillingly I assume 
the sly and servile manner of disreputable people who 
walk with eyes asquint and cringing back in search 
of an outstretched hand! The horrible thing about 
it, you see, is that I am perfectly conscious of the fact 
that it is Juliette’s beauty that protects me. It is the 
desire which she awakens, it is her mouth, it is the 
mystery of her nude and defiled body which in this 
pleasure-seeking world shields me with a false esteem, 
with a lying semblance of respect. A handshake, a 
grateful look seems to say: ‘I have been with your 
Juliette, and I owe that to you. Perhaps you prefer 
money? Do you want it?’ Yes, just let me quit Juliette 
and with one kick I shall even be thrown out of this 
crowd, this facile, fawning and perverted crowd and 
shall be reduced to sordid association with gamblers 
and pimps!” 

I burst out sobbing. Lirat did not stir, did not raise 
his head. Motionless, with clasped hands he was 
looking at something I knew not what. . . nothing, I 
suppose. After a few moments of silence I continued: 

“My good Lirat, do you remember our talks in 
your studio! I used to listen to you, and what you 
told me was so beautiful! Without suspecting it, per- 
haps, you awoke noble desires and sublime raptures 
in me. You breathed into me a little of the belief, 
ambition and lofty flights of your soul. You taught 


CALVARY 199 


me how to read nature, to understand her passionate 
tongue, to feel the emotions latent in things. You 
proved to me the existence of immortal beauty. You 
said to me: ‘Love, why it is in the earthenware 
pitcher, it is in the verminous rags which I paint. To 
take a feeling, a joy, a moment of suffering, of palpita- 
tion, a vision, a shudder —anything, no matter how 
fugitive an experience of life it may be—and re- 
create it, fix it in colors, in words or sounds, means 
to love! Love is a man’s yearning to create!’ 

“ And I dreamed of becoming a great artist! Ah! 
my dreams, my delights in being able to perceive 
things, my doubts, my sacred agonies, do you remem- 
ber them? Look what I have done with all that! I 
wanted to love and I went to a woman who kills love. 
I started with wings, drunk with the air, with the 
azure, with light! And now I am nothing but a dirty 
hog, sunk in its filth, with greedy snout and sides 
shaking with impure rutting. You can see for your- 
self, Lirat, that I am lost, lost, lost! .. and that I 
must kill myself.” 

Then Lirat approached and put both hands on my 
shoulders: 

“You say you are lost! Let us see now; when one 
is of your stock, can one say that a man’s life is lost? 
You say you must kill yourself? Does a man who has 
typhoid fever say: ‘I must kill myself?’ He says: ‘I 
must cure myself!’ You have typhoid fever, my poor 
child. . . cure yourself. Lost! Why, there is not a 
crime, do you hear me, there is not a crime, no matter 
how monstrous and vile, that can not be redeemed by 
forgiveness. I don’t mean God’s forgiveness or man’s 
forgiveness, but one’s own forgiveness, which is much 
more difficult and more worth while to obtain. Lost! 
I was listening to you, my dear Mintié, and do you 
know what I was thinking? I was thinking that you 


200 CALVARY 


had the noblest and most beautiful soul that I ever 
knew. No, no. . . a man who accuses himself as you 
do. . . who puts into his confession of sin the heart- 
rending accents which you have put in yours just 
now. .. why no—that man is never lost. On the 
contrary, he finds himself again and he is near redemp- 
tion. Love has passed over you and has left all the 
more filth in its wake because of your extremely 
delicate nature. Well! You must wash this filth off — 
and I know where the water is that will wash it off. 
You are going to leave this place. . . leave Paris.” 

“ Lirat!” I entreated, “don’t ask me to leave! I 
have tried it twenty times and I cannot do it.” 

“You are going away,” repeated Lirat, whose face 
suddenly darkened. “Or else I am mistaken about 
you, and you are a scamp!” 

He resumed: 

“In the heart of Brittany there is a fishing village, 
which is called Le Ploch. The air there is pure, nature 
is superb, man rugged and kind. It is there that you 
are going to live three months, six months, a year if 
necessary. You will walk along the sandy shore, across 
the heath, through pine forests, over rocks; you will 
dig the soil, you will catch sea wrack, you will lift 
logs, you will shout in the wind. There, at last, you 
will subdue this poisoned body insane with love. In 
the beginning it will be hard for you and you will per- 
haps feel homesick. .. you will rebel, you will be 
seized with passionate desires to return. Don’t be 
discouraged, I beseech you. On days especially hard 
to bear, walk all the more. . . spend nights out on the 
sea with the brave people of the place. . . and when 
your heart is heavy, weep, weep. Above all, keep from 
leading an indolent life, from dreaming, from reading, 
from carving your name on the rocks and tracing it 
on the sand, Don’t think of anything, don’t think at 


CALVARY 201 


all! On such occasions, literature and art are poor 
counsellors, they are apt to bring you back to love 
again. Incessant activity of your body, hard physical 
labor, your flesh worn out by crushing fatigue, your 
head lashed and made giddy by the wind, by the rain, 
by storms! I tell you, you will come back from that 
place not only cured but stronger than ever and better 
armed for struggle. And you shall have paid your 
debt to that monster. You say, you shall have paid 
it with your fortune? Well what of it, that’s nothing. 
Why, I envy you and wish I could go with you. Come, 
my dear Mintié, a little courage! Go!” 

“Yes, Lirat, you are right. I must go away.” 

“Well go then!” 

“Tam going away tomorrow, I swear!” 

“Tomorrow? Ah, tomorrow! She is going to come 
back, isn’t that the idea? And you will throw your- 
self in her arms again. No, go now!” 

“Let me write to her. I can’t leave her like this, 
without a word, without saying good bye to her. Lirat 
just think! In spite of all this suffering, in spite of 
all this shame, there still are happy memories, bliss- 
ful hours. She is not wicked. . . she simply does not 
know. . . that’s all. . . but she loves me. I shall go 
away, I promise you I shall. But give me just one 
more day! One more day! One day is not much, es- 
pecially since I shall not see her any more! Ah, one 
more day!” 

“No, go now!” 

“Lirat! My good Lirat!” 

“ No! ” 

“But I have no money! How do you expect me to’ 
go without money?” 

“T have enough left to last you over the trip; I’ll 
send it to you there. Go!” 

“At least let me get my things ready!” 


202 CALVARY 


“T have some wool stockings and caps; that’s what 
you need. Go!” 

He hurried me away. Without seeing anything, 
without realizing anything, I went through the apart- 
ment, bumping into pieces of furniture. I did not 
feel any pain, for I was insensible to everything; I was 
walking behind Lirat with the heavy step and the pas- 
sive gait of a beast led to slaughter. 

“ Well where is your hat?” 

“ That’s right! I went out without a hat. I did not 
think that I was abandoning, that I was leaving behind 
anything that was a part of me; that the things which 
I saw, in the midst of which I lived, were dying one 
after another as soon as I passed by them.” 

The train left at eight o’clock in the evening. Lirat 
did not leave me all day. Wishing, no doubt, to occupy 
my mind and to keep my will power at its highest 
pitch, he spoke to me with broad gestures; but I did 
not hear anything except a confused noise, annoying 
me and buzzing about my ears like pestering flies. We 
dined in a restaurant near the Mont Parnasse railroad 
station. Lirat continued to talk, stupefying me with 
gestures and words, tracing strange geographic lines 
with his knife on the table. 

“Look, there’s where it is! Then you will follow 
this side... and. . .” 

I believe he was giving me instructions about my 
trip to the place of exile I was bound for. . . told 
me the names of villages, persons. The word ‘sea’ 
recurred again and again with the rumble of pebbles 
washed by the waves and rubbing against one another. 

“Will you remember? ” 

And without knowing exactly what he referred to, 
I answered: 

“Yes, yes, I’ll remember.” 

It was only at the station, this vast building, filled 


CALVARY 203 


with noise and bustle, that I realized my situation. I 
felt terribly downhearted. And so I was going away! 
It’s all over then! Never again shall I see Juliette, 
never again! At this moment I forgot all my suffering, 
my shame, my ruin, the irreparable conduct of Juliette 
and remembered only our brief moments of happiness, 
and I rebelled against the injustice of being separated 
from my well-beloved. Lirat meantime was saying: 

“ And then, if you only knew what a bliss it is to 
live among the lowly, to study their poor but worthy 
life, their resignation of martyrs, their... .” 

I had a notion to escape his surveillance, to flee then 
and there. A foolish hope kept me from doing that. 
I said to myself: ‘ Celestine will no doubt bring word 
to Juliette that Lirat has been at the house, that he 
has led me away by force; she will understand at once 
that something horrible is happening, that I am at this 
station, that I am going to leave. And she will come 
running.’ I really believed she would. So strong was 
my faith that through the large open windows, I 
watched the people who were entering; I searched 
among the various groups, examined closely the dense 
crowd of passengers standing in front of the track 
gate. And whenever some elegant lady appeared I 
gave a Start, ready to dart toward her. Lirat went on: 

“ And to think that there are some people who con- 
sider them brutes, these heroes! Ah! you will see 
those magnificent brutes with their horny hands, their 
eyes full of infinitude, and their backs which make 
one weep.” 

Even on the platform I was still hoping for Juliette’s 
arrival. Surely in a second she will be here, pale, van- 
quished, suppliant, with outstretched arms: “ My Jean, 
my Jean, I was a bad woman, forgive me! Don’t bear 
me ill-will on account of that, don’t forsake me. What 
do you expect me to become, without you? Oh, come 


204 CALVARY 


back, my Jean, or else take me along!” And silhouettes 
fitted and disappeared in the cars; fantastic shadows 
crept along and split against the walls; long whitish 
columns of smoke spread out under the vaulted roof... 

“Embrace me, my dear Mintié. Embrace me!” 

Lirat drew me close to his breast. He was crying. 
“Write to me as soon as you get there. Good bye!” 

He pushed me into a car and drew the door curtain. 

“Good bye!” 

A whistle, then a dull rolling. . . then lights chasing 
one another. .. things receding somewhere. . . then 
nothing. . . except black night. Why did Juliette not 
come? Why? And in the midst of rumpled skirts on 
the carpets, in her dressing room, in front of her look- 
ing glass, I clearly see her, bare-shouldered, applying 
rice powder to her face. Celestine with her soft flaccid 
fingers is sewing on a band of crepe at the bottom of 
the low cut waist, and a man whom I don’t know, re- 
clining on the sofa, with crossed legs, watches Juliette 
with eyes in which desire is gleaming. The gas is 
burning, candle lights are blazing, a bouquet of roses 
which someone has just brought, mingles its more 
delicate perfume with the violent odors of dresses! 
And Juliette takes a rose, twists its stem, straightens 
out its petals and sticks it in the button-hole of the 
man with a tender smile. A bonnet with hanging 
strings is perched on top of a chandelier. .. . 

And the train is moving on, puffing, panting. The 
night is ever black, and I am plunging into nothing- 
NON 2%: 


CHAPTER IX 


* 


elbows sunk in the sand with head buried 

in my hands, and staring into the space be- 
fore me, I dream. ... The sea is in front of me, 
immense and glaucous, streaked with violet shad- 
ows, plowed by mighty billows whose crests, 
rising and falling back and forth, are white in the sun. 
The reefs of la Gamelle from time to time un- 
cover the dark points of their rocks and send forth 
a dull noise like a distant cannonade. Yesterday the 
tempest broke loose; today the wind has subsided, but 
the sea still refuses to quiet down. The waves come 
up, swell, roll, rise, toss up their manes of swirling 
foam, break into ripples and fall back upon the pebbles, 
flat and broken, with a frightful roar of rage. But 
the sky no longer threatens, streaks of blue appear 
between the rifts of clouds swiftly borne away, and 
the seagulls are soaring high in the air. The fishing 
boats have just left the harbor, they are receding in 
the distance, diminishing, separating, becoming in- 
distinct and finally vanishing. To my right, dominated 
by sinking dunes, is the strand extending as far as 
Ploch, which one can see behind a rise in the ground in 
the midst of dreary verdure, the roofs of the nearest 
houses, the belfry of granite stone at the end of which 
there rises a lighthouse. Beyond the pier the eye can 
see limitless expanses of pink shores, silvery bays, soft- 
blue cliffs covered with mist, so faint in the distance 
that they look like columns of vapor, and the ever pres- 
ent sea and the ever present sky which blend together 
yonder into a sort of mysterious and poignant elimi- 


L_ wv flat upon the dune, face downward, my 


206 CALVARY 


nation of all things. . . . To my left the dune, where 
the broomrape spreads its corymbs of purple flowers, 
ends abruptly. The ground rises, becomes steep and 
the rocks pile up, topple over, form openings of roar- 
ing abysses or plunge into the sea, cleaving its body 
like the prows of giant vessels. Further on there is 
the beach again. 

The sea, held back by the shore, ever turbulent and 
white with foam, leaps and beats impetuously against 
the side of the cliffs. And the shore continues jagged, 
indented and worn away by the eternal onrush of the 
waves crumbling into a chaotic mass or rising and 
shaping themselves into awesome shadows against the 
sky. Over my head flocks of linnets are flying, and 
above the rage of the waves the wind brings to me the 
plaint of cock-pigeons and curlews. 

It is here that I come every day. Whether it be 
windy or rainy, whether the sea howl or hum peace- 
fully, whether it be clear or dark, I always come to 
this place. . . . It is not, however, because the sight 
impresses and moves me or that the terrible or charm- 
ing aspect of nature consoles me. I hate this nature; 
I hate the sea, I hate the sky, the cloud that passes, 
the wind that blows, the birds that circle in the air; 
I hate everything that surrounds me, everything that 
I see, everything that I hear. I come here by force 
of habit, impelled by an animal instinct which calls 
animals back to the place that is familiar to them. Like 
the hare, I have dug my seat in the sand and I always 
come back to it. Whether it is upon the sand or on 
the moss, in the shadow of the woods, in the depths 
of the caves or in the sun of the solitary strand — 
does not matter! 

Where can a man who suffers find refuge? Where 
look for the voice that soothes! Where can he find 
compassion which dries the eyes that weep? Oh! I 


CALVARY 207 


know these chaste dawns, these gay noon hours, these 
pensive evenings and starry nights! . . . These end- 
less distances where the soul expands, where sorrows 
dissolve. . . Ah! I know them! . . . Beyond this hori- 
zon line, beyond this sea, are there no countries like 
the rest? Are there no people, no trees, no noises? 
‘There is no rest, no silence for me! ... To die! .. 
But who can assure me that the thought of Juliette 
will not come to mingle with the worms to eat me 


up? ... One stormy day I was face to face with 
Death and I prayed to be taken by him. But Death 
turned away from me. . . . He spared me, me who am 


useless for anything or to anybody, to whom life is 
more of a torture than the carcass of a condemned 
criminal or the chain-shot of a galley-slave, and he 
took another instead — a strong, brave and kindly man 
for whom poor creatures were waiting! Yes, one time 
the sea snatched me, rolled me on its waves and then 
cast me up alive again upon the seashore, as if I were 
unworthy to perish in it. 

The solid mass of clouds breaks up, becomes 
whiter. The sun showers the sea with rays of bril- 
liant light, the changing green of the sea grows softer, 
becomes golden in some places and opalescent in 
others, and near the shore above, the bubbling line is 
variegated with all the shades of pink and white. The 
reflections of the sky which the waves endlessly divide, 
which they break up into a multitude of small frag- 
ments of light, glitter upon the agitated surface. Behind 
the harbor the slender mast of a cutter, which men 
are towing on the bowline, glides along slowly, then 
the hull appears, the hauled-up sails swell out, and 
gradually the vessel moves aways, dancing on the 
waves. Along the beach which the ebb tide uncovers, 
an angler is walking hastily, and ship-boys come run- 
ning to the shore bare-legged, wade in the mud 


208 CALVARY 


puddles, pick up rocks covered with seaweed, in 
search of loaches and crabs. ... Pretty soon the 
vessel is nothing but a greyish speck on the horizon 
line which grows thinner, enveloped in a vacuous 
fog. . . . One can see that the sea is getting calm. 

It is already two months that I have been here! . . 
two months! .. . I have walked on the roads, in the 
fields, through the heaths; I know all the grass blades, 
all the rocks, all the crosses watching over the cross- 
roads. ... Like a tramp I have slept in the ditches, 
my limbs made numb by the cold, and I have crawled 
ito the foot of the rocks, upon beds of humid foliage; 
I have wandered over the beach and the cliffs, blinded 
by the sand, lashed by the spray, deafened by the wind; 
with bleeding hands and bruised knees I have climbed 
rocks inaccessible to men, haunted only by sea ravens; 
I have spent sorrowful nights on the sea and I have 
seen sailors crossing themselves in the terror of death; 
I have rolled from the tops of huge boulders, and with 
the water up to my neck, swept by dangerous currents, 
I have fished sea weeds; I have climbed trees and I 
have dug the earth with a mattock. 

The people here thought that I was out of my mind. 
My arms are broken. My flesh is bruised. And yet 
not for a minute, not for a second has my passion de- 
serted me, it has possessed me even more than in the 
past. I feel how it strangles me, how it squashes my 
brains, crunches my chest, gnaws my heart, dries up 
my veins. ...I am like a small animal attacked by 
a polecat; no matter how much I roll on the ground 
desperately struggling with its teeth, the polecat holds 
me and won’t let me go. Why did I go away?... 
Couldn’t I hide myself away in a room at some fur- 
nished house? ... Juliette would come to see me 
from time to time, nobody would know that I existed, 
and in my obscurity I could enjoy my heavenly as 


CALVARY 209 


well as abominable bliss. . . . Lirat had spoken to me 
of honor, of duty, and I believed him! ... He had 
said to me: “ Nature will console you.” And I be- 
lieved him! Lirat had lied to me. Nature has no 
soul. Entirely given over to her eternal labor of de- 
struction, she whispers to me nothing but thoughts of 
death and crime. Never has she bent over my burn- 
ing forehead to cool it or stooped over my panting 
breast to calm it. And infinitude has only brought 
sorrow closer to me! Now I can no longer resist, and 
vanquished, I abandon myself to grief, without even 
making an effort to drive it away occasionally. 

Though the sun rise in the splendor of silver gilt 
dawns, though it go down in purple glory, though the 
sea display its gems, though everything glitter, sing 
and emit sweet odors, I don’t want to see anything, I 
don’t want to hear anything. . . . I only want to see 
Juliette in the fugitive outline of the clouds; I only 
want to hear Juliette in the errant plaint of the wind, 
and I am ready to kill myself just to grasp her elusive 
image in the things about me! ...I1 see her at the 
Bois smiling, happy with her freedom. I see her pro- 
menading in the stage boxes; I see her especially at 
night, in her bedroom. Men enter and go out, others 
come in and leave, all sated with love! By the glimmer 
of the night lamp, obscene shadows dance and grimace 
around her bed; laughter, kisses and dull spasms are 
stifled in the pillows, and with a swooning look, with 
trembling mouth, she offers everyone her luxurious 
body which never tires of pleasure. With my brains 
on fire, sinking my nails into my throat, I shriek: 
“Juliette! Juliette!” as if it were possible for Juliette 
to hear me across the space: “Juliette! Juliette!” 
Alas! the cry of the sea-gulls and the rumbling noise 
of the waves beating against the rocks are the only 
things that answer: “ Juliette! Juliette!” 


210 CALVARY 


And evening comes. ... The fogs float up, pink 
and weightless, enveloping the shore, the village, while 
the jetty, almost black, assumes the appearance of the 
hull of a huge vessel without masts; the sun inclines 
its copper-colored ball toward the sea, tracing a path 
of rippling, crimson light upon its limitless extent. 
Near the shore the water grows darker, and sparkles 
flare up on the crests of the waves. At this sad hour 
I return through the fields, meeting again the same 
carts pulled by oxen covered with cloths of grey flax, 
seeing the same silhouettes of peasants who, bent 
over the niggardly soil, struggle grimly with the heath 
and the rocks. And upon the heights of Saint-Jean 
where the windmills rotate their sails in the blue of 
the sky, the same calvary stretches out its supplicating 
arms. ... 

I lived at the end of the village with Mother Le 
Gannec, an excellent woman who took care of me as 
well as she could. The house which opened on the 
main road was clean, well-kept, furnished with new 
and shining furniture. The poor woman strove to 
please me, worked desperately to invent something 
that would smooth my brow, that would bring a smile 
upon my lips. She was really touching. Every time 
I came down in the morning I would find her, knitting 
stockings or spinning, finished with her housework, 
alive, alert, almost pretty in her flat cap, her short 
black shawl, and her apron of green serge. 

“Friend Mintié!” she would exclaim, “I have 
cooked some nice shell-fish fricassee for supper for 
you. . . . If you like sea-eel soup better, I’ll make you 
some sea-eel soup.” 

“Just as you please, Mother Le Gannec.” 

“ But you always say the same thing. Ah! by Jesus! 
Friend Lirat was not like you at all. ‘Mother Le 
Gannec, I want some oysters and some periwinkles. ’ 


CALVARY 211 


To be sure I gave him some oysters and some peri- 
winkles! ... But he was never as sad as you are. 
Why no, indeed!” 

And Mother Le Gannec told me some stories about 
Lirat who stayed with her a whole autumn. 

“And he was so lively and so intrepid! ... He 
would go out in the rain ‘to take some views.’ It did 
not hurt him a bit. He would come back drenched to 
the bones but always gay, always singing! ... You 
ought to have seen that fellow eat! Ah, he could 
swallow the sea in the morning!” 

Sometimes, to distract me, she told me her misfor- 
tunes, simply, without complaining, repeating with 
sublime resignation: 

“Whatever the good Lord wishes, we must wish 
also. To cry over it all the time won’t help matters a 
bit.” 

And in a musical voice which all Bretons possess, 
she used to say: 

“Le Gannec was the best fisherman in Ploch and 
the most daring seaman on the entire coast. There was 
none whose fishing boat was better equipped, none 
who better knew reefs abounding with fish. When- 
ever a fishing boat dared out in stormy weather it was 
sure be the Marie Joseph. Everybody held him in 
high esteem not only because he was courageous but 
because his conduct was beyond reproach and worthy. 
He shunned the cabarets like a pest, detested drunk- 
ards, and it was an honor to be of the same mind as 
he was. I must also tell you that he was the comman- 
der of a life boat. We had two boys, friend Mintié, 
strong, well-built and able, one was eighteen years 
old and the other twenty, and the father expected 
both to be brave seamen as he was. ... Ah! If you 
had only seen my two handsome boys, friend Mintié! 
Things were coming along nicely, in fact so nicely 


212 CALVARY 


that with our savings we were able to build this house 
and buy this furniture. And so we were contented! 
One night, it was two years ago, the father and the 
boys did not return! I was not alarmed at all. It often 
happened that he had gone out far, as far as Croisic, 
Sables or Herbaudiére. Was it not his business to 
follow the fish? But days passed and none showed 
up! And the days were still passing. . . . And not one 
came back! Every morning and every evening I used 
to go to the harbor and look at the sea... . I used 
to ask the fishermen whom I happened to meet: ‘ Have 
you seen the Marie Joseph yet?’ ‘ No,’ someone would 
answer, ‘I wonder why they haven’t come back?’ ‘I 
don’t know.’ ‘Do you think some misfortune hap- 
pened to them?’ ‘It’s quite possible!’ And while 
saying this the fisherman would cross himself. Then 
I burned three candles at the Notre Dame du Bon 


Voyage! ... Finally one day, they came back, all 
three of them, in a big cart, black, swollen, half de- 
voured by crabs and starfishes. .. . Dead. . . . Dead. 


. all three of them, my man and my two hand- 
some boys. The keeper of the Penmarch lighthouse 
had found them washed upon the rocks.” 

I was not listening and was thinking of Juliette. 
Where is she? Why does she keep silent? Eternal 
questions! 

Mother Le Gannec continued: 

“I don’t know your affairs, friend Mintié, and I 
don’t know why you are so unhappy, but you have 
not lost your man and your two boys at one stroke as 
I have! And even if I don’t cry, friend Mintié, that 
does not keep me from feeling sad, you see!” 

And when the wind howled, when the sea rumbled 
from afar, she would add with a grave voice: 

“Holy Virgin, have pity on our poor children over 
yonder on the sea.” 


CALVARY 213 


While I was thinking: 

“Perhaps she is dressing now. Maybe she is still 
sleeping, worn out during the night.” 

I used to go out, walk through the village and seat 
myself on a stump on the Quimper road, at the foot 
of a long acclivity, waiting for the postman to arrive. 
The road, laid out in the midst of rocks, is flanked on 
one side by a long embankment topped by fir trees, 
on the other side it dominates a small arm of the sea, 
which winds round the heath, bare and flat, in the 
midst of which puddles are shining. Here and there 
cones of grey rock rise up in the air; a few pines 
spread their blue crowns in the foggy atmosphere. 
Over my head, ravens never cease flying, strung out 
in a black and endless line, hastening toward I know 
not what voracious feasts, and the wind brings the 
sad tinkling of bells hung on the necks of the scat- 
tered cows, grazing upon the niggardly grass of the 
heath. 

As soon as I would see two little white horses and 
a coach with a yellow body descending the hillside in 
the clatter of old iron and bells, my heart would start 
beating faster. . . “‘ There is perhaps a letter from her 
in that coach!” I would say to myself. And that 
old, dilapidated vehicle creaking on its springs ap- 
peared to me more splendid than a royal carriage, and 
the driver with his crush hat and his red face looked 
to me like a deliverer of some kind. How could 
Juliette write to me when she did not know where 
I was? But I was still hoping for a miracle! Then 
I would go back to the village, walking hastily, assur- 
ing myself by a succession of irrefutable arguments, 
that on that day I was going to get a long letter, in 
which Juliette would let me know of her coming to me, 
and I was reading in advance, her tender words, her 
passionate phrases, her repentance; on the paper I saw 


214 CALVARY 


traces of tears wet as yet, for all this while, I thought, 
Juliette was passing her time in crying. Alas! 
Nothing came from her. Sometimes there was a letter 
from Lirat, admirable, fatherly in its contents, which 
bored me. With heavy heart, feeling more than ever 
the crushing weight of loneliness, my mind excited 
by a thousand projects, one more foolish than the 
other, I would return to my dune. From this short- 
lived hope I would pass to keenest sorrow, and the 
day would pass in invoking Juliette, in calling her, 
in begging for her from the pale flowers on the sands, 
from the foam of the waves, from all this insensible 
nature about me which denied her to me and which 
ever revealed her indistinct image, marred by the 
kisses of everybody. 

“ Juliette! Juliette!” 

One day, on the jetty, I met a young lady in the 
company of an old gentleman. Tall, slender, she 
looked pretty under her veil of white gauze which 
covered her face and whose ends, tied at the back of 
her grey felt hat, fluttered in the wind. Her graceful 
and supple movements resembled those of Juliette. 
Indeed in the way she carried her head, in the delicate 
curves of her waist line, in the way her arms fell, in 
the ruffling of her dress in the air, I recognized some- 
thing of Juliette. I looked at her with emotion and 
two tears rolled down my cheeks. She walked to the 
end of the pier. I sat down on the parapet and, pen- 
sive and fascinated, followed the silhouette of the 
young lady. As she was moving away, I felt affected 
more and more. ... Why had I not known her be- 
fore I met the other one? I would have loved her 
perhaps! A young girl who has never felt the impure 
breath of man upon her, whose ears are chaste, whose 
lips have never known lewd kisses, what a joy it 
would be to love her, to love her as angels do! 


CALVARY 215 


The white veil was fluttering above her like the 
wings of a sea-gull. And suddenly she disappeared 
behind the lighthouse. At the bottom of the jetty 
the sea splashed back and forth like a child’s cradle 
rocked by a nurse who hums a lullaby, and the sky 
was cloudless; it was stretched above the motionless 
surface of the water like a huge flowing curtain of 
light muslin. 

The young lady was not long in coming back. She 
passed so near that her dress almost brushed against 
me. She was blond; I should have liked it better if 
she were dark as Juliette was. She walked away, 
left the jetty, took to the village road and pretty soon 
I saw only a white veil which seemed to say: “ Good- 
bye, goodbye! Don’t be sad, I shall come back.” 

In the evening I asked Mother Le Gannec about 
her. 

“That’s demoiselle Landudec,” she replied, “a very 
excellent and well deserving girl, friend Mintié. The 
old gentleman is her father... They live in the big 
chateau on the Saint Jean road. You know which one 
I mean. ... You have been there several times.” 

“ How is it that I have never seen them?” 

“Ah! Lord!...j/That’s because the old man is 
always sick and the girl stays at home to take care 
of him, the poor thing! Undoubtedly he must have 
felt better today and she took him out for a walk.” 

“Hasn’t she got a mother?” 

“No. Her mother has been dead for quite some 
time.” 

“Are they rich?” 

“Rich? Not so very! But they help everybody 
... If you only went to mass on Sunday you would 
see the kind young lady.” 

That evening I remained to talk with Mother Le 
Gannec much longer. I saw the kindly lady again 


’ 


216 CALVARY 


several times on the jetty, and on those days the 
thought of Juliette was less oppressive. I wandered 
in the neighborhood of the chateau which looked to 
me as desolate as the Priory. Grass was sprouting in 
the courtyard, the lawns were not well kept, the 
alleys of the park were broken up by the heavy carts 
of nearby farmers. The grey stone facade, turned 
green by rain, was as gloomy as the large granite 
rocks that one saw on the waste land.... The follow- 
ing Sunday I went to mass, and I saw demoiselle 
Landudec praying among the peasants and fishermen. 
Kneeling on her prayer stool, her slim body bent like 
a primitive virgin, her head over a book, she prayed 
with fervor. Who knows? Perhaps she understood 
that I was unhappy and mentioned my name in her 
prayers? And while the priest was chanting his ori- 
son in a tremulous voice, while the nave of the church 
was being filled with the noise of wooden shoes beat- 
ing against the slabs and with the whisper of lips 
in prayer, while the incense in the censer rose to the 
ceiling together with the shrill voices of the children 
in the choir, while the young lady prayed as Juliette 
would have done had she prayed at all, I was dream- 
ing.... I was in the park, and the young lady ap- 
proached, bathed in moonlight. She took my hand, 
and we walked on the lawns and in the shadow of 
rustling trees. 

“Jean,” she said to me, “you are suffering and I 
have come to you. I have asked God if I could love 
you. God permits. I love you!” 

“You are too beautiful, too pure, too holy to love 
me! You must not love me!” 

“T love you! Put your arm in mine, rest your head 
on my shoulder and let us walk together, always!” 

“No, no! Is it possible for the lark to love the 
owl? Is it possible for the dove that flies in heaven to 


CALVARY 217 


love the toad which hides itself in the mud of stagnant 
waters?” 

“ You are not an owl, and you are not a toad, for I 
have chosen you! The love which God has permitted 
me to bear blots out all sin and assuages all sorrow. 
Come with me and I shall give you happiness.” 

“No, no! My heart is cankered, and my lips have 
drunk the poison which kills souls, the poison which 
damns angels like you; don’t look at me so, for my 
eyes will defile you and you will be like Juliette!...” 

The mass was over, the vision disappeared. There 
arose a noise of moved chairs and heavy steps in the 
church, and the children of the choir put out the tapers 
on the altar.... Still kneeling, the girl was praying. 
Of her face I could distinguish only a profile lost in 
the shadow of the white veil. She got up, after mak- 
ing the sign of the cross. I had to move my chair 
to let her pass. She passed...and I felt a real joy, 
as though in refusing the love which she offered me in 
thought I had just now fulfilled a great duty. 

She occupied my mind for a week. I resumed my 
furious walks through the moor, on the strand, and I 
wished I could conquer my passion. While walking, 
driven by the wind, carried along by that peculiar 
exaltation occasioned by rain pelting the sea shore, 
I imagined all sorts of romantic conversations with 
demoiselle Landudec and nocturnal adventures which 
took place in enchanted and lunar places. Like the 
characters in an opera, we vied with each other in 
sublime thought, in heroic sacrifices, in wonderful de- 
votion ; under the spell of the passionate rhythms and 
stirring recurrences of the song of the elements, we 
extended the boundaries of human self-denial. A 
sobbing orchestra accompanied the anguish of our 
voices. 

“T love you! I love you 


”? 
! 


218 CALVARY 


“No, no! You must not love me!” 

She, in a very long white gown, with a bewildered 
look and outstretched arms... I, gloomy, inexorable, 
the calves of my legs swelling under the violet silk 
tight garment, my hair disheveled by the wind. 

“T love you! I love you!” 

“No! No! You must not love me!” 

And the violins emitted inaudible plaints, the wind 
instruments moaned, while the double basses and the 
dulcimers rumbled like tempest and peals of thunder. 

Oh, the tragi-comedy of sorrow! 

A curious thing! Demoiselle Landudec and Juliette 
became one; I no longer separated them, I confused 
them in my dreams, extravagant and melodramatic. 
Both were too pure for me. 

“No! No! I ama leper, leave me alone!” 

They passionately kissed my wounds, spoke of death 
and cried: “I love you! I love you!” 

And vanquished, subdued, redeemed by love I fell 
at their feet. The old father, dying, spread his arms 
over us and blessed us, the three of us! 

This trance did not last long; I soon found myself 
on the dune, face to face with Juliette. 

There were no violins, no wind instruments any 
longer, only the howl of anguish and revolt, the cry of 
a captured stag craving the female of its species. 

“Juliette! Juliette!” 

One evening I returned home more despondent than 
ever, my mind obsessed with dismal projects, my arms 
and hands in some manner agitated by a mad desire 
to kill, to strangle. I would have liked to feel some- 
thing alive writhing, rattling, dying under the pressure 
of my fingers. Mother Le Gannec was standing at 
the threshold, darning the never failing pair of stock- 
ings. She said to me: 


CALVARY 219 


“How late you are today, friend Mintié! I have 
prepared some nice sea-crab for you!” 

“Leave me alone, you drivelling woman!” I 
shouted. “I don’t want your sea-crab, I don’t want 
anything, do you hear me?” 

And sputtering angry words, I brutally made her 
step aside to let me pass. The poor kindly woman, 
stupefied by my action, lifted her arms to heaven and 
moaned. 

“ Ah! My Lord! Ah, Jesus!” 

I went to my room and locked myself in. At first I 
rolled on the bed, smashed two chairs, beat my head 
against the wall. Then, I suddenly sat down to write 
a letter to Juliette, exalted, raging, full of terrible 
threats and humble entreaties; a letter in which I 
spoke of killing her, of forgiving her, in which I 
begged her to come to see me before I died, describing 
to her in tragic detail the cliff from which I was going 
to throw myself into the sea. I compared her to the 
lowest women in the brothel and two lines further I 
compared her to the Holy Virgin. More than twenty 
times I started this letter over again, excited, weeping, 
in turn delirious with rage and swooning with tender- 
ness. Presently I heard a noise behind the door like 
the scratching of a mouse. I opened it. Mother Le 
Gannec was standing there, trembling and pale; she 
looked at me with her kind, bewildered eyes. 

“What are you doing here?” I shouted. “ Why 
do you spy on me? Go away!” 

“Friend Mintié,’” muttered the sainted woman, 
“don’t be angry. I can see that you are unhappy and 
I came to know if I can help you!” 

“Well, suppose I am unhappy! Does that concern 
you? Here, take this letter to the post office and 
leave me in peace.” 

For four days I did not leave my room. Mother 


220 CALVARY 


Le Gannec came to make my bed and serve my meal. 
She was humble, timid, more attentive than ever, 
sighing: 

“Ah! What a misfortune! My Lord, what a mis- 
fortune! ” 

I realized that I was not acting as I should; she had 
been so kind to me; I wanted to ask forgiveness for 
my rudeness. Her white coif, her black shawl, her sad 
figure of an afflicted mother touched me. But a sort 
of foolish pride threw a damper on this effusion. She 
walked near me, resigned, with an air of infinite 
motherly pity; from time to time she repeated: 

“Ah! What a misfortune! My Lord! What a 
misfortune! ” 

The day drew to a close. While Mother La Gannec, 
after having mailed the letter, was sweeping the room, 
I sat at the window, my elbows resting on the ledge. 
The sun had disappeared behind the horizon line, 
leaving of its dazzling glory only a reddish transpar- 
ency on the sky, and the sea, grown dark, dull, no 
longer reflecting light, assumed a sad hue. Night 
came, silent and slow, and the air was so calm that 
one could hear the rhythmic noise of oars striking 
the water of the wharf and the distant creaking of 
halliards on the masts tops. The beacon light was 
turned on, its red light turning in space like some 
irrational astral body.... And I felt very unhappy! 

Juliette did not answer me!... Juliette would not 
come!... My letter, no doubt, had frightened her. 
She had recalled furious, savage, strangling scenes. 
She was afraid and would not come! And besides, 
were there not races, banquets, dinners, a line of im- 
patient men at her door, waiting for her, claiming her, 
men who had paid in advance for the promised night? 
Why should she come, after all? There was no Casino 
on this desolate beach; in this God-forsaken corner of 


CALVARY 221 


the coast there was no one to whom she could sell 
herself. 

As for me, she had taken all my money, my brains, 
my honor, my future, everything! What more could 
I give her? Nothing. Why then should she come? 
If I had only told her that I had ten thousand francs 
left she would have come running. But to what pur- 
pose? Ah! Let her not come! My anger subsided, 
self-disgust replaced it, a frightful disgust! How could 
it be possible that a man who was not bad, whose 
past aspirations lacked neither nobility of character 
nor ardor, should fall so low, in such a short time, into 
a mire so deep that no human force could lift him out 
OF tho 

What I now suffered from was not so much my own 
follies, my own disgrace and crimes as the misery 
which I had caused those around me. Old Marie!.. ; 
Old Felix! . . . Oh, the poor couple! Where were they 
now? What were they doing? Did they have any- 
thing to eat, at least? Had I not compelled them to 
beg their bread when I expelled them—so old, so 
kind, so confiding, more feeble and desolate than 
homeless dogs! I saw them bent over their staffs, 
horribly thin, coughing, harassed, spending nights in 
chance lodgings. And the sainted Mother Le Gannec 
who took care of me as a mother her child, who lulled 
me to sleep with her warm caresses like those be- 
stowed on little ones! Instead of kneeling before her, 
of thanking her, did I not treat her brutally, did I not 
almost beat her! Ah, no! Let her not come! Let 
her not come! 

Mother Le Gannec lit the lamp, and I was about to 
close the window when I heard the tinkling of small 
bells upon the road, then the trundling of a carriage. 
I mechanically looked out. Indeed a carriage had 
ascended the steep hill of this place, it was a sort of 


222 CALVARY 


stage which appeared very high and loaded with 
trunks. A fisherman passed by. The postman asked 
him: 

“ Will you please tell us where the house of Madame 
Le Gannec is?” “It is in front of you,” answered the 
fisherman, who indicated the house with a motion of 
hand and continued on his way. 

I grew very pale .. . and I saw by the light of the 
lantern a small gloved hand resting on the handle of 
the stage door. 

“Juliette! Juliette!” I shouted like a madman. 
“Mother Le Gannec, it’s Juliette! ... Quick, quick 

. it’s Juliette!” 

Running, tumbling down the stairway, I dashed to 
the street: “Juliette! My Juliette!” 

Arms embraced me, lips pressed against my cheek, 
a voice breathed in my ears: 

“Jean! My dear little Jean!” 

And I swooned into the arms of Juliette. 

It did not take me long to regain my senses, how- 
ever. They put me to bed and Juliette, bent over me, 
embraced me, crying: 

“Ah! Poor little thing. How you frightened me! 
How pale you still are! Is it all over, tell me? Speak 
to me, my Jean!” 

I did nothing but look at her. It seemed as though 
my whole being, inert and rigid, smitten by a powerful 
blow, by some great suffering or happiness—I did 
not know which — had brought back and crowded into 
my glance all the life forces leaving me, dripping from 
my limbs, my veins, my heart, my brains... . I was 
looking at her! She was still beautiful, a little paler 
than in the past, but on the whole the same as ever, 
with her beautiful, sweet eyes, her lovely mouth, her 
deliciously childish voice. In her countenance, her 
gestures, the movements of her body, her words I 


CALVARY 223 


wanted to find some sorrowful traces of her unknown 
existence, some blemish, some evidence of depravity, 
something new and more withered. But no, she was 
paler, and that was all. And I burst into tears. 

“Sit still, I want to look at you more, my little 
Juliette!” 

She drank in my tears and wept, holding me in a 
close embrace. 

“My Jean! Ah, my adored Jean!” 

Mother Le Gannec rapped at the door of the room. 
She did not speak to Juliette, pretending not to see her. 

“ What shall I do with the trunks, friend Mintié?” 
she asked, 

“Have some one bring them up here, Mother Le 
Gannec.” 

“You could not bring them all up here,” the old 
woman harshly replied. 

“Have you got many of them, dearie?” 

“Many? Why no! There are only six. These peo- 
ple are stupid!” 

“Well, Mother Le Gannec,” I said, “keep them- 
downstairs tonight. We shall see tomorrow.” 

I got up, while Juliette examined the room, occa- 
sionally exclaiming: 

“Why, it’s so nice here! There’s a lot of fun here, 
my dear. And you have a bed, too, a real bed. And 
I thought they slept in wardrobes in Brittany! Ah! 
What is that? Don’t stir, Jean, don’t stir.” 

From the mantlepiece she took a large shell and 
put it to her ear. 

“Wait!” she said with disappointment. “ Wait 
now, it does not make that sh-sh-sh sound. Why is 
that?” 

She suddenly rushed into my arms and covered me 
with kisses. 

“Ah! your beard! You are growing whiskers, you 


224 CALVARY 


villain! Ah how long your hair is! And how thin 
you are! And I, have I changed much! Am I still beau- 
tiful? ” 

She placed her arms around my neck and rested her 
head on my shoulder: 

“Tell me what you have been doing here, how you 
have spent your time, what you have been thinking 
about. Tell it all to your little wifie. And don’t tell 
lies. Tell her everything, everything.” 

Then I described my furious walks, my prostrations 
on the dune, my sobbing, the fact that I had been 
seeing her everywhere, calling her like a madman in 
the wind, in the tempest. 

“Poor little thing!” she sighed. “And you prob- 
ably have not even a raincoat.” 

“And you? you, my Juliette? Did you ever think 
of me?” 

“Ah! When I found you gone from the house I 
thought I would die. Celestine told me that a man 
had come to take you away! Still I waited... ,. He 
will come, he will come. ... But you did not come 
back. The next morning I ran to Lirat! Oh, if you 
only knew how he received me! . . how he treated 
me! And I asked everybody: ‘Do you know where 
Jean is?’ And no one could answer me. Oh, you 
naughty boy! To leave me like that. . . without a 
word! Don’t you love me any more? Then, you un- 
derstand, I wanted to forget myself. I was suffering 
too much.” 

Her words had a sharp, curt ring in them: 

“As for Lirat, you may rest assured, my dear, I’ll 
get even with him. You'll see! It'll be a farce! What 
a mean person your friend Lirat is! But you'll see.” 

One thing tormented me: how many days or, weeks 
would Juliette stay with me? She had brought six 
trunks with her; hence she intended to remain at 


CALVARY 225 


Ploch for a month at least,—perhaps longer. To- 
gether with the great anticipated joy of possessing 
her without fear or obstacle, there mingled a keen un- 
easiness. I had no money, and I knew Juliette too 
well not to realize that she would not resign herself 
to a life like mine, and I foresaw expenditures which 
I was not in a position to make. What was to be done? 
Not having enough courage to ask her conte I an- 
swered: 

“We have plenty of time to think of it, my dear. 
In about three months from now when we shall go 
back to Paris. 

“Three months! Why no, my poor little thing, I 
leave in a week. I am so sorry.’ 

“Stay here, my little Juliette, I implore you, stay 
here altogether. Stay longer! A fortnight!” 

“It is impossible, really. Oh, don’t be sad, my dear! 
Don’ t cry! If you cry I won’t tell you something very 
nice.’ 

She became more affectionate, nestled and resumed : 

“ Listen, my dear. I have only one thought, and that 
is to live with you! We shall leave Paris, we shall 
move into a small house, hidden so well, you see, that 
no one will know that we are living. All we need 
is an income of twenty thousand francs.” 

“Where do you expect me to get that much now?” 
I exclaimed discouraged. 

“ Now, listen to me,” continued Juliette. “ We need 
only twenty thousand francs. Well, I have figured it 
all out! In six months we shall have it. 

Juliette looked at me with a mysterious air and 
repeated: 

“We shall have it!” 

“Please don’t talk like that, my dear. You don’t 
know how you hurt me.” 


226 CALVARY 


Juliette raised her voice, the wrinkle on her fore- 
head grew rigid. 

“Then you want me always to belong to others?” 

“Oh! keep still, Juliette! Keep still! Never talk to 
me like that, never!” 

“You are so funny! Come now, be nice and em- 
brace me!” 

The next morning, while dressing in the midst of 
opened trunks and scattered dresses, very much dis- 
concerted by the absence of her chamber maid, she 
made all sorts of plans for the day. She wanted to 
take a walk on the jetty, to visit the lighthouse, to 
fish, to walk to the dune and sit down on the spot where 
I had cried so much. She said she enjoyed watching 
the pretty Breton girls in braided and embroidered 
dresses, like those in the theatre, drinking fresh milk 
on the farms! 

“ Are there any boats here?” 

“ec Yes.” 

“ Lot of them?” 

“ Certainly.” 

“ Ah! What a chance. I like boats so much!” 

Then she gave me news of Paris. Gabrielle no longer 
lived with Robert. Malterre was married. Jesselin 
was ona trip. He had had several duels. And gossip 
about everybody. All this bad odor of Paris brought 
back my melancholy and bitter memories. Seeing me 
sad, she interrupted herself and embraced me, assum- 
ing an air of distress: 

“Ah! Perhaps you suppose I like this life!” she 
said plaintively, “and that I only think of amusing 
myself, of flirting. If you only knew! There are cer- 
tain things that I can’t tell you. But if you knew what 
a torture it is to me! You think you are unhappy! How 
about me? Why, if I did not have the hope of living 


CALVARY 227 


with my Jean I would kill myself, so often do I feel 
disgusted with life.” 

And, dreaming and wheedling, she would revert to 
the subject of farming, of hidden paths covered with 
verdure, of the peace and sweetness of a retired life 
amid flowers, domestic animals and love. Ah! de- 
voted, humble, eternal love, love that was to brighten 
our life like the dazzling sun! 

We went out after the breakfast which Mother Le 
Gannec sullenly served us, without once opening her 
mouth. We were hardly out, when the wind fresh- 
ened; it disheveled Juliette’s hair. She wanted to 
return to the house. 

“ Ah! The wind, dear! I can’t stand the wind. It 
spoils my hair and makes me sick.” 

She was bored all day and our kisses could not 
dispel the feeling of emptiness. Just as in the past, 
in my study, she spread a napkin on her dress, placed 
a few small nail brushes and files on the napkin, and 
gravely began to polish her nails. I suffered cruelly, 
and the vision of the old man at the window ob- 
sessed me. 

The next day Juliette announced that she had to 
leave that very evening. 

“Ah! What a misfortune, my dear! I have for- 
gotten! Quick, quick, get me a carriage. Oh! what 
a misfortune! ” 

I made no effort to detain her. Sunk in my chair 
motionless, gloomy, my head buried in my hands, I 
sat throughout the preparations for her departure 
without uttering a single word or making a single 
request. Juliette went out, returned, folding her 
gowns, arranging her dressing-case, locking her 
trunks; I heard nothing, saw nothing, knew nothing. 
Men came in; their heavy steps caused the floor to 


228 CALVARY 


creak. I understood that they were taking the trunks 
away. Juliette sat on my lap. 

“My poor little dear,” she cried, “ you suffer be- 
cause I leave so soon. You should not feel hurt. . . 
be sensible. Besides, I’ll come back shortly and stay 
along time. Don’t act so. I’ll come back. I promise 
you. I’ll bring Spy along. I'll also bring a horse to 
ride on, yes? You'll see how well your little wifie 
rides on horseback. Now embrace me, my Jean! Why 
don’t you embrace me? Come on, Jean! Good bye! 
I adore you! Good bye!” 


It was growing dark when Mother Le Gannec came 
into my bedroom. She lit the lamp and gently ap- 
proached. 

“Friend Mintié! Friend Mintié!” 

I lifted my eyes; she was so sad, there breathed 
such merciful pity from her that I threw myself into 
her arms. 

“Ah! Mother Le Gannec! Mother Le Gannec!” I 
sobbed. “ That is what is killing me!” 

Mother Lé Gannec murmured: 

“Friend Mintié, why don’t you pray to the merciful 
Lord? That will relieve you.” 


CHAPTER X 


is a hood of red hot iron upon my head. My blood 

thickens, one might say that my dilated arteries 
were bursting, and I have the sensation of tongues 
of fire licking my loins. Whatever human quali- 
ties there still remained in me, what little shame, re- 
morse, self-respect and vague hopes buried under the 
heap of filth have been left in me by moral suffering, 
the little that has still held me bound by a thread, be 
it ever so weak, to thinking creatures—all this has 
now been destroyed by the madness of a frenzied 
brute. No longer do I entertain thoughts of Good, 
Truth, Justice, the inflexible laws of nature. I am no 
longer conscious of the sexual aversion which exists 
between the various species in the animal kingdom, 
keeping the world in constant harmony: everything is 
in a whirl, everything is confused into one tremendous 
and sterile carnal essence and, in the delirium of my 
senses, I rave only of unnatural embraces. Not only 
does the image of prostituted Juliette no longer torment 
me, but on the contrary it excites my passions! And in 
my mind I seek, I cling to her, I try to fix her in my 
memory by ineffaceable marks, I confound her with 
things, with beasts, with monstrous creatures and I 
myself lead her to criminal debauchery, spurred on 
by burning pains. Juliette is no longer the only image 
that tempts and haunts me. Gabrielle, the Rabineau 
woman, Mother Le Gannec, Demoiselle Landudec, 
pass before my eyes in wanton postures. Neither 
virtue, nor goodness, nor unhappiness, nor sacred old 
age holds me back, and for the scene of these fright- 


[: is a week since I have been able to sleep. There 


230 CALVARY 


ful frenzies I purposely choose holy and hallowed 
places, altars in churches, tombs at the cemeteries. 
I no longer suffer in my soul; I suffer only in my 
flesh. My soul died in Juliette’s last kiss, and now I 
am nothing but a form of foul, sensuous flesh, into 
which demons have been furiously at work pouring 
streams of molten, seething metal. Oh! I could never 
have forseen such castigation ! 

The other day I met a fisherwoman on the strand. 
She was black, dirty, foul-smelling, like a heap of putri- 
fied sea wrack. I made advances to her with silly 
gestures. And suddenly I fled, for I felt a diabolic 
temptation to rush upon her and throw her down 
amid the pebbles and small pools of water. I roamed 
and tramped across the country with dilated nostrils, 
taking in, like a harrier, the odor of sex. ... One 
night, with burning throat, driven mad by abomin- 
able visions, I found my way into the crooked alleys 
of the village and rapped at the door of a loose woman. 
And I went into this den. But as soon as I felt the 
unknown contact I uttered a cry of rage; I wanted to 
leave; she held me back. 

“Let me go!” I shouted. 

“Why are you going away?” 

“Let me go!” 

“Stay here. I’ll love you. I often followed you on . 
the beach. I often roamed about the house where you 
are staying. I wanted you. Stay here!” 

“Let me go, I tell you! You don’t know how dis- 
gusting you are to me!” 

And when she hung on my neck, I struck her. She 
groaned. 

“Ah! My God! He is mad!” 

Mad! Yes, I am mad! I have looked at myself in 
the mirror and I am afraid of my own image. My dis- 
tended eyes shine from the midst of their orbits which 


CALVARY 231 


are hollow; my bones protrude from under the yellow 
skin; my mouth is pale, trembling, hanging like the 
mouths of lascivious old men. My gestures are erratic, 
and my fingers, constantly agitated by nervous shocks, 
crack, seeking a prey in the air. 

Mad! Yes, I am mad! Whenever Mother Le Gannec 
is moving about me, when I hear her slippers drag- 
ging on the floor, when her dress brushes against me, 
criminal notions come and take possession of me; 
they pursue me and I cry: 

“Go away, Mother Le Gannec, go away.” 

Mad! Yes, I am mad! Often at night I stand for 
hours at the door of her room, my hand upon the knob, 
ready to plunge into the darkness of the room. I don’t 
know what is holding me back. Fear, no doubt, for 
I say to myself: “ She will struggle, cry, call for help 
and I shall be compelled to kill her!” Once, alarmed 
by the noise, she got up, barelegged; she was dumb- 
founded for a moment, upon beholding me. 

“What is the matter! It’s you, friend Mintié? 
What are you doing here? Are you ill?” 

I stammered some incoherent words and went up- 
stairs to my room. 

Ah! Let them drive me out, beat me, with forks, 
stakes, scythes. Is it possible that men will not come 
in here in a moment, rush upon me, gag and drag me 
into the eternal night of the dungeon? 

I must go away! I must find Juliette again! I must 
vent this accursed madness upon her! 

When dawn came I went downstairs and said to 
Mother Le Gannec: “I must leave! Let me have some 
money. I shall pay it back to you later. Let me have 
some money. I must leave!” 


CHAPTER XI 


second floor of a furnished house in the Faubourg 

Saint-Honoré near the Rue de Balzac. The fur- 
niture of the room was rickety, the tapestry worn, the 
drawers creaked when opened, the pungent odor of de- 
caying wood and accumulated dust filled the window 
curtains and bedstead hangings; but by placing knick- 
knacks here and there, she succeeded in imparting an 
air of intimacy to this banal, cold place, where so 
many unknown lives had been spent without a trace 
being left behind. Juliette reserved to herself the task 
of arranging my things in the hanging-press which 
she filled with bunches of fragrant flowers. 

“You see, my dear, here are your socks, and there 
are your night shirts. I put your neckties in the 
drawer; your handkerchiefs are there. I hope your 
little wifie has put everything in order. And every 
day I'll bring you a sweet-smelling flower. Now 
don’t be sad. Tell yourself that I love you, that I 
love no one but you, that I shall come often. Oh, I 
have forgotten a few things! Well, I’ll send them to 
you with Celestine, together with my pictures in the 
beautiful red plush frames. Don’t feel lonesome, my 
poor, little thing! You know, if I am not here at half- 
past twelve tonight don’t wait for me. Go to bed. 
Sleep well. Promise me?” 

And casting a last glance about the room, she left. 

Indeed, Juliette came every day, while going to the 
Bois and on her way home before dinner. She never re- 
mained more than two minutes at a time. Excited, 
impelled by a feverish desire to be outside, she would 


J scons to had chosen a room for me on the 


CALVARY 233 


stay long enough to embrace me and to open the 
drawers to see whether my things were in order. 

“Well Iam going. Don’t be sad. I see you have 
been crying. That is not nice at all! Why cause me 
aggravation?’ 

“Juliette! Will I see you tonight? Oh! please, to- 
night!” 

“ Tonight?” 

She reflected for a minute. 

“Tonight, yes, my dear! But still do not wait for 
me too long. Go to bed. Sleep well. Above all, 
don’t cry. You drive me to despair! Really, I don’t 
know what to do with you!” 

And so I lived here, stretched out on the sofa, never 
going out, counting the minutes which slowly, slowly, 
drop by drop, vanished into the eternity of waiting. 

The frenzied excitement of my senses was succeeded 
by a period of great depression. I spent whole after- 
noons apathetically, without stirring, my body lifeless, 
my limbs hanging, my brains in a state of torpor, like 
the morrow of a day of drunkenness. My life re- 
sembled a heavy slumber disturbed by painful dreams, 
interrupted by sudden awakenings even more painful 
than the dreams; and in the annihilation of my will 
power, in the blotting out of my intellect, I again felt, 
but more keenly than ever, the horror of my moral 
decay. In addition, Juliette’s life caused me perpetual 
anguish. As in the past, on the dune of Ploch, I could 
not dismiss from my mind the loathsome vision which 
grew, intensified and assumed even more cruel forms. 
. .- To lose a person whom you love, a person who 
has been the source of all your joys, the memory of 


whom is associated with happiness only, is a heart- | 


rending sorrow. But where there is sorrow there is also 
consolation, and suffering is eventually put to sleep, 
lulled in some way by its own tenderness. But here I 


\ 


234 CALVARY 


was losing Juliette, losing her daily, every hour, every 
minute; and with this chain of successive deaths, with 
this process of impenitent dying, I could only asso- 
ciate memories of torture and disgrace. 

No matter how eagerly I searched in the stirred-up 
depths of our two hearts for a flower bud, for a tiny 
blossom whose fragrance it would have been so sweet 
to inhale, I could not find it. And yet I could not 
conceive anything dissociated from Juliette. All my 
thoughts had Juliette for their starting point and for 
their final goal, and the more she escaped me the 
more fiercely obdurate I grew in my absurd desire to 
win her back. I had no hope at all that she would 
ever stop, carried away as she was by this life of evil 
pleasure; yet, in spite of myself, in spite of her, I was 
planning for a better future. I said to myself: “It 
is impossible that some day disgust will not seize her, 
that some day sorrow will not awaken remorse and 
pity in her heart. Then she will return to me. Then 
we will move into a plain workman’s house and I shall 
work like a galley-slave. I'll enter journalism, I'll 
publish novels, I’ll ask for a job as a plain copyist.” 
Alas! I forced myself to believe all this so as to accen- 
tuate the state of misery into which I had fallen. With 
the proceeds from the sale of two sketches by Lirat, 
of a few jewels I still had, of my books, I had realized 
a sum of four thousand francs, which I was saving 
like a treasure for that chimeric eventuality. 

One day when Juliette was pensive and tenderer 
than usual, I ventured to lay my project before her. 
She clasped her hands. 

“Yes! Yes! Ah! Won’t that be nice! A little bit 
of an apartment, a tiny one. I’ll do the housekeeping, 
I’ll have pretty bonnets, a pretty apron! But with you 
it'll be impossible! What a pity! It’s impossible! ” 

“Why is it impossible? ” 


CALVARY 235 


“ Because you won’t work and we'll starve. That’s 
your nature! Did you work at Ploch. Are you work- 
ing now? Why, you have never worked!” 

“ How can I? Don’t you know that the thought of 
you never leaves me for a moment? It is the uncer-_ 
tainty of your life, it is the cruel anguish of every- 
thing I feel, of everything I suspect about you that 
gnaws at my heart, devours me, sucks my brains! 
When you are not here, I don’t know where you are! 
And still I am always with you wherever you are! 
Ah! if you only wished! To know that you are near 
me, loving and tranquil, far from everything that be- 
smirches, from everything that torments. Why, I could 
then have the strength of a God in me! Money! 
Money! Why, I’ll make it for you by the shovelful, 
by the cartful! Ah! Juliette if you only wished... .” 

She looked at me, excited by the great noise of gold 
which my words caused to ring if her ears. 

“Well! Make it right away, dearie. Yes, make a 
lot of it, piles of it! And don’t think about those vile 
things which make you suffer! Men are so funny! 
They don’t want to understand anything! ” 

Tenderly, she sat down on my lap. 

“Why, I adore you, my dear little thing! Why, I 
detest the others and I give them nothing of myself, 
do you hear, nothing. I am very unhappy!” 

With tear-filled eyes, she tried to nestle near me, re- 
peating: “ Yes very, very unhappy!” 

I was seized with fear and pity. 

“ Ah! He thinks it is a pleasure!” she cried sobbing, 
“he thinks so! But if I did not have my Jean to con- 
sole me, my Jean to lull me to sleep, my Jean to give 
me courage, I could not stand it any longer. I could 
not stand it any longer. . . . I would rather die.” 

Suddenly, changing the subject, and: with a voice 
in which I seeemd to hear a plaint of regret: 


236 CALVARY 


“First of all, you need money for that,—for the 
little apartment, | mean. . . and you haven’t got it!” 

“ Why yes, yes, my dear,” I exclaimed triumphantly, 
“T have some money. We have enough to live on 
for two months, three months while I make my for- 
tune!” 

“You have money? Let me see it.” 

I showed her four one thousand franc bills. Juliette 
greedily snatched them one after another, counted 
them, examined them. Her eyes shone, surprised and 
delighted. 

“ Four thousand francs, dear! you really have four 
thousand francs! Why, you are rich! Well, well!” 

She hung on my neck, caressed me. 

“Well now,” she resumed, “since you are so rich, 
I should like to have a little traveling dressing case 
that I saw at the Rue de Paix. You will buy it for me, 
won’t you, dearie?” 

I felt a tug at my heart so painful that I nearly fell 
to the floor, and a well of tears blinded me. Still I had 
the courage to ask: 

“How much does your dressing case cost?” 

“Two thousand francs, my dear.” 

“All right! Take two thousand francs out of that. 
You'll buy it yourself.” 

Juliette kissed my forehead, took the two bills which 
she quickly hid in her coat pocket, and her gaze fixed 
on the two bills which still remained and for which 
she no doubt regretted she had not asked, she said: 

“Really? Do you want me to? Ah! that’s nice! 
That will give me a chance to come to see you with 
my new dressing case, if you should return to Ploch.” 

When she was gone, I abandoned myself to an out- 
burst of anger against her, above all against myself, 
and when the anger subsided I suddenly realized to 
my astonishment that I no longer suffered. Yes, I 


CALVARY 237 


breathed more freely, I was able to stretch out my 
arms with greater vigor, I felt a new buoyancy in my 
limbs; at last, one might say, some one had removed 
the crushing weight which for so long a time I had 
borne on my shoulders. I experienced a keen joy in 
moving my limbs, in exercising my muscles and joints, 
in setting my nerves into vibration, when it thus came 
upon me one morning, in a leap from my bed. Was I 
not really awakening from a slumber as deep as death? 
Was I not recovering from a sort of catalepsy, in 
which my whole being, sunk in torpor, had known 
the horrible nightmare of non-existence? I was like 
one buried who finds the light of day again, like one 
famished who is given a piece of bread, like one sen- 
tenced to death who receives his pardon. . . . I went 
to the window and looked out into the street. The 
slanting rays of the sun were flooding the houses in 
front of me with a golden mist; on the sidewalk people 
were hurriedly passing, preoccupied, with a happy 
gait; carriages joyously crossed each other’s path. 
The hustle and bustle and noise of life intoxicated, 
stirred, carried me away, and I cried out: 

“T don’t love you any more! I don’t love you any 
more!” 

In the space of a second I had a very clear vision of 
a new life of work and happiness. I was to cleanse 
myself of this filth, to seize my interrupted dreams; 
not only did I want to redeem my honor, but I wanted 
also to achieve a glory so great, so undisputed, so uni- 
versal, that Juliette would burst with spite for having 
lost a man like me. I already saw myself perpetuated 
in bronze and marble by posterity, placed upon 
columns and symbolic pedestals, filling the centuries 
to come with my immortalized image. And what gave 
me particular pleasure was the thought that Juliette 


238 CALVARY 


would not share a particle of this glory, and that I 
pitilessly pushed her off my lofty plane entirely. 

I went down, and for the first time in two years 
felt a delicious pleasure in being on the street. I 
walked fast, with supple movements, a victorious gait, 
interested in the simplest things about me which 
seemed so new. And I asked myself with amazement 
how in the world I could have been unhappy so long, 
why my eyes had not opened to the truth much sooner 
than they did. . . . Ah, that despicable Juliette! How 
she must have laughed at my submission, my blind- 
ness, my pitifulness, my inconceivable folly! No doubt, 
she told her casual lovers of my idiotic grief. But I 
was going to have my revenge and it would be ter- 
rible! Juliette would soon lie prostrate at my feet 
begging my pardon. 

“No, no, you miserable creature, never! . . When 
I cried, did you comfort me? ... Did you spare me 
a single suffering, a single one? Did you ever for a 
moment consent to share my misery, to live my life 
with me? You don’t deserve to share my glory. No. .. 
go! ” 

And to show my absolute contempt for her, I would 
throw millions in her face. 

“Here are your millions! You said you wanted 
millions? Here are some more!” 

Juliette would wring her arms in despair. 

“Have mercy, Jean! Have pity on me! I don’t want 
your money! What I want is to live in obscurity and 
humbly in your shadow, happy if a single ray of light 
surrounding you will some day come to rest upon your 
poor Juliette. Have pity on me!” 

“ Did you have pity on me when I asked for it! No! 
Women like you should be killed with blows of gold. 
Here! Have some more! Here! Some more still!” 


CALVARY 239 


I was walking with long strides, talking aloud, 
moving my hands as if throwing millions into space. 

“ Here, wretch, here!” 

Nevertheless, my insusceptibility to everything else 
when preoccupied with the thought of Juliette was 
not so complete as to preclude my getting uneasy at 
the sight of any woman, and scrutinizing with an im- 
patient glance the inside of the carriages which end- 
lessly passed by on the street. On the boulevard my 
assurance left me, and anguish again seized my whole 
being. I felt an unbearable burden upon my shoulders, 
and the devouring beast driven off but a moment ago, 
rushed on me more ferociously than ever, sinking 
its fangs into my flesh deeper than ever. It was enough 
for me to see the theatres, the restaurants, those evil | 
places full of the mystery of Juliette’s life, to make 
me feel this. The theatres were saying to me: “She 
was here that night; while you were moaning, calling 
her, waiting for her—she was promenading in her 
stage box, with flowers on her bosom, happy, without 
the slightest thought of you.” The restaurants were 
saying: “ That night your Juliette was here. . . With 
eyes drunk with lust she was rolling on our broken 
sofas, and men who smelled of wine and cigars pos- 
sessed her.” And all the agile, handsome young men 
I met on the street seemed to say to me: “ We know 
your Juliette. Does she give you any of the money 
she charges us?” Every house, every object, every 
manifestation of life cried with a frightful chuckle: 
“ Juliette! Juliette!” The sight of roses at the florist’s 
was painful, and I felt rage boil within me each time 
I looked at the shop windows with their display of 
inviting things. It seemed to me that Paris was 
spending all its power, using all its seduction, to rob 
me of Juliette, and I wished to see it perish in some 
catastrophe; I regretted that the rigorous days of the 


240 CALVARY 


Commune were over, when one could pour petroleum 
and scatter death upon the streets! I returned home. 

“ Did anyone call?” I asked the caretaker. 

“ No, Monsieur Mintié.” 

“No letters either?” 

“No, Monsieur Mintié.” 

“ Are you sure nobody went up to my room while I 
was away?” 

“ The key was not touched.” 

I scribbled the following words on my card: “I 
want to see you.” 

“Take this over to the Rue de Balzac.” 

I waited in the street, impatient, nervous; the care- 
taker was not long in returning. 

“The maid told me that Madame had not yet come 
back.” 

It was seven o’clock. I went to my room and 
stretched out on the sofa. 

“She won’t come. Where is she? What is she 
doing?” 

I did not light the candles. The window, illum- 
inated by the street, shone in the room with a dark 
glimmer, reflected a yellow shine upon the ceiling, 
where appeared the trembling shadow of the curtains. 
And the hours passed, slow and endless, so endless 
and so slow that one might say the flow of time had 
suddenly stopped. 

“She won’t come!” 

From the street, the intermittent noise of vehicles 
reached me; the buses rolled heavily, the closed car- 
riages passed by lightly and rapidly. When one of 
them passed close to the sidewalk or slowed down I 
would rush to the window, which I had left half-open, 
to look into the street. . . . No one alighted. 

“She won’t come!” 

And while saying to myself; “She won’t come,” I 


CALVARY 241 


hoped that Juliette would be in shortly. Oh, how 
many times I had rolled on the sofa, crying: “She 
won’t come!” And Juliette always came. Always 
at the moment when I most despaired, I heard a car- 
riage stop, then steps on the stairway, a creaking noise 
in the hallway, and Juliette would appear smiling, 
adorned with plumes, filling the room with a strong 
odor of perfume and the rustling of silk in motion. 

“Come on, get your hat, my dear.” 

Irritated by her smile, by her dress, by the perfume, 
exasperated by the long waiting, I used to upbraid 
her severely: 

“Where have you been? In what joints have you 
been? Yes, tell me, in what joints?” 

“ Ah! You are trying to make a scene. Well, thanks! 
I am leaving. Good night! And here I have taken 
all the pains in the world to snatch a moment to look 
you up!” ‘ 

Then pointing my finger to the door, my muscles 
contracted, I would burst out: 

“Well, go ahead! Go to the devil! And never come 
back again, never!” 

With the door scarcely shut behind Juliette, I would 
run after her. 

“Juliette! Come back, please! Juliette! Wait... . 
I am going with you.” 

She would still be descending the stairs, without 
turning her head. I would catch up with her. 

Near her, near this dress, these plumes, these flowers, 
these jewels, fury would again seize me: 

“Come right up with me or I’ll crack your head 
against these steps! ” 

And when in the room I would throw myself at her 
feet. 

“Ah, my little Juliette, I am wrong, I know I am 
wrong. But I suffer so much! Have pity on me! If 


242 CALVARY 


you only knew in what a hell I am living! If you could 
only tear my breast open and see what is going on in 
my heart! Juliette! Oh, I can’t, I can’t go on living 
like this any more! Even a beast would have pity on 
me. Yes, a wretched beast would have pity on me!” 

I would press her arms, cling to her dress. 

“My Juliette! I have not killed you, though I 
have a perfect right to, I swear. I have not killed 
you! You should have given an account of yourself. 
I must make inhuman efforts to control myself, for 
you don’t know what terrible and vengeful things a 
man who suffers and is lonely can conceive. I have 
not killed you! I have been hoping!—TI am still hop- 
ing! Come back to me. I'll forget everything, I’ll 
erase everything from my memory, my sorrow and 
my shame. ... Yliou will be to me the purest, the 
most radiant of virgins. We’ll go away, far, far away 
from here. Wherever you wish. I shall marry you! 
Don’t you want me to? Do you think I am telling you 
this in order to have you with me again? Swear to 
me that you will change your mode of life and I'll 
kill myself here in front of you! Listen, I have sacri- 
ficed everything for you! I am not talking of my 
fortune, but of what was formerly the pride of my 
life, my manly honor, my dream of an artist, all this 
I have given up for you, without the least regret. You 
should make some sacrifice for me in turn. And pray, 
what is it I ask of you? Nothing. . . except the glad- 
ness of being honest and good. To devote, to con- 
secrate oneself to something, why that’s so grand, so 
noble! Oh, if you only knew the infinite pleasure of 
sacrifice? Look now. . Malterre is rich. He is a 
good fellow, better than the others, he loved you! 
I’ll go to him, I'll say to him: ‘ You alone can save 
Juliette, you alone can save Juliette, you alone can 
bring her back from the life she is living. Go back 


CALVARY 243 


to her, and don’t be afraid of me. I am going out 
of her life.’ Do you want me to do that?” 

Juliette would look at me, greatly astonished. An 
uneasy smile would play on her lips. She would mur- 
mur: 

“Come, my dear, you say silly things. Don’t cry, 
come!” 

While going out, I would continue to lament: “A 
beast would have pity on me! Yes, a beast!” 

At other times, she would send Celestine for me, 
and I would find her in bed, cold, sad and tired. I could 
see that some one had been there just a moment ago, 
some one who had just left; I could see it in every- 
thing that surrounded me—=in the bed just made, in 
the toilette articles arranged with overscrupulous care, 
in all the carefully removed traces which in my imag- 
ination reappeared again in all their hidden and sor- 
rowful reality. I would linger in the dressing room, 
rummage among the drawers, examine objects, even 
lower myself to a shameful scrutiny of her personal 
belongings. . . . Juliette would call me: 

“Come over here, my dear! What are you doing 
there?” 

Oh! If I could only reconstruct his image, find the 
least trace of that man! I inhaled the air, inflated my 
nostrils, hoping to come upon the strong male scent, 
and it seemed to me that the shadow of a mighty torso 
spread itself over the hangings, that I distinguished 
huge, athletic arms, quivering thighs with bulging 
muscles. 

“Are you coming?” Juliette would repeat. 

On those nights Juliette would talk of nothing but 
the soul, the sky, the birds, telling me that she was in 
need of an ideal, of celestial dreams. Huddled in my 
arms, chaste as a child, she would say, with a sigh: 

“ Oh, how nice it is to sit like this! Tell me some- 


244 : CALVARY 


thing beautiful, my Jean, some such thing as one reads 
about in poetry. I love your voice so much; it is so 
musical . . . speak to me long. You are so good, you 
comfort me so well! I would like to live all my life 
like this, always in your arms, without stirring, listen- 
ing to you! Do you know what else I would like to 
have? Ah, I am dreaming of it all the time! I would 
like to have a nice little baby girl who should be like 
a cherub, all pink and blond! I would nurse her my- 
self and you would sing her some pretty little songs 
to put her to sleep! My Jean, when I am dead you 
will find in my jewelry case a little pink writing book 
with gold ornaments. That’s for you. Take it. There 
I have written down my thoughts, and you'll see 
whether I loved you or not! You'll see! Ah! To- 
morrow one must get up again, go out... how an- 
noying! Rock me, speak to me, tell me that you love 
my soul... my soul!.. .” 

And she would fall asleep, and in her sleep look so 
white, so pure, that the bed curtains would seem like 
wings attached to her. 

Night came on, the suburb grew quiet. From afar, 
belated carriages were returning, and on the sidewalk 
two policemen paced with heavy, dragging strides, 
keeping in step. ... Several times the door of the 
furnished house opened and closed; I heard some 
creaky noise, the rustling of a woman’s dress, whis- 
pering voices in the hallway. But it was not Juliette. 
The silent house seemed to have been asleep a long 
while. I left the sofa, lit my lamp, looked at the 
clock; it was three o’clock. 

“She won’t come! Now it’s all over. She won’t 
come!” 

I stood at the window. The street was deserted, 
the dark sky hung over the houses like a leaden lid. 
Over yonder in the direction of Boulevard Haussman 


CALVARY 245 


large vehicles were coming down hill, shaking the 
night with their loud jolting. ... A rat darted from 
one sidewalk to the other and disappeared into a hole 
in the gutter. . . . I saw a homeless dog with hanging 
head and tail between its hind legs passing, stopping 
at the doors, smelling the gutter, dolefully walking 
away. 

I shook with fever, my brain was inflamed, my 
hands were moist and again I felt a stifling sensation 
in my chest. 

“ She won’t come! Where is she? Did she go back 
to her house? Where, in what filthy hole of this great 
impure night is she wallowing?” 

What made me particularly angry was that she did 
not let me know ahead of time. She had received my 
card. She knew she was not coming. And she did 
not send me a single word! I had cried, implored, 
begged her on my knees ... and not a word from 
her! How many tears, how much blood must one 
shed to soften that heart of flint? How could she run 
after pleasure with her ears still full of the echoes of 
my sobs, her mouth still moist with my entreating 
kisses? The most wretched women, the most detest- 
able creatures at some time or other call a temporary 
halt to their life of dissipation and prey; there are 
moments when they permit the sun to penetrate their 
chilled hearts, when turning their eyes to heaven they 
pray for love that pardons and redeems! But Juliette 

. never! Something more insensible than fate, 
something more relentless than death was driving her, 
was eternally drawing and spurring her on without 
respite, without pause, from impure to criminal love, 
from that which dishonors to that which kills! The 
more days passed, the more marks of infamy de- 
bauchery left on her. With her passion, formerly so 
normal and healthy, were now mingled a depraved in- 


246 CALVARY 


quisitiveness and that savage unsatiableness, that over- 
stimulation of irrepressible lust which comes as result 
of excessive and sterile pleasures. Except on the 
nights when exhaustion invested the sordid reality of 
her existence with unexpected forms of the purest 
ideal, one could see upon her the imprints of a thous- 
and different and refined corruptions, of a thousand 
grotesque perversions practiced upon her by those 
palled by vice and age. Words and cries often es- 
caped her which suddenly lit up her whole life and 
opened up vistas of frenzied sensuality, and although 
she would thereby communicate to me the consuming 
passion of her depravity, although I myself relished 
in all this a sort of infernal criminal voluptuousness, I 
could not look at Juliette without a shudder! . . . And 
when leaving her embrace, ashamed and disgusted, I 
felt the need, often experienced by reprobates, of look- 
ing at tranquil, restful sights, and I envied, — oh, with 
what keen regret!—the superior beings who had 
made purity and virtue the inflexible laws of their 
life! . . . I dreamed of convents where one spent one’s 
life in prayer, of hospitals where one devoted oneself 
to others. . . . I was seized with a mad desire to enter 
the disreputable joints and preach the gospel to the 
unfortunate people who wallow in vice there, never 
hearing a single word of kindness; I promised my- 
self to follow the prostitutes at night, into the shadow 
of public squares, to console them, to speak to them 
of virtue with such passionate earnestness, in accents 
so touching that they would be moved, would burst 
into tears and would say to me: “Yes, save us... .” 
I liked to spend hours in the Monceau park, watching 
the children play, discovering a paradise of goodness 
in the glances of young mothers; I was moved to re- 
construct their lives so remote from my own; to live 
through, while near them, their sacred joys forever 


CALVARY 247 


lost to me. .. . On Sundays I used to loiter at the 
railway stations where I mingled with the merry 
crowds, among’ petty officials and workingmen leav- 
ing town with their families to get a little fresh air 
for their affected lungs, to gather a little strength to 
be able to withstand the fatigue of their work during 
the week. I followed the steps of some laborer whose 
face interested me; I would have liked to possess his 
bent back, his deformed hands turned brown through 
hard work, his stiff walk, his trusting eyes of a house 
dog. ... Alas! .. I would have liked to have every- 
thing I did not have, to be everybody that I was not! 
. These wanderings which rendered the realization 
of my downfall even more painful, did me some good, 
however, and I used to come home each time with 
all sorts of courageous resolutions. ... But in the 
evening I would see Juliette again, and Juliette was 
to me the oblivion of all honor and all duty. 
Above the houses the sky was brightened by a 
feeble light announcing the approaching dawn, and 
at the end of the street, in the shadow, I noticed two 
glaring points, the two lights of a carriage, vacillating, 
swerving, approaching, which resembled two errant 
gas lamps. . . . Hope revived in me for a moment. . . 
the carriage came nearer, dancing on the pavement, 
the lights grew larger, the rattling quickened. . . 
I thought I recognized the familiar trundling of 
Juliette’s brougham! ... But no! ... Suddenly the 
carriage turned to the left and disappeared. . . . With- 
in an hour it would already be day! 
“She won’t come! ... This time it is all over, she 
won’t come!” 
I closed the window, lay down again on the sofa, 
blood surging in my temples, all bigs members aching. 
. In vain I tried to sleep. . . . I could not do any- 
thing but weep, cry out: 


248 CALVARY 


“Oh! Juliette! Juliette!” 

My chest was burning, I felt the sensation of boiling 
lava swirling in my head. My thoughts were in con- 
fusion, turning into hallucinations. Along the walls of 
my bedroom weasels were chasing one another, jump- 
ing, abandoning themselves to obscene frolics. I was 
hoping that I would succumb to fever, that it would 
chain me to my bed, that it would cause my death. 
To be sick! Ah! .. yes, to be sick, long, forever! I 
had visions of Juliette installing herself in my room. 
She nursed me, she lifted my head to make me take 
medicine, she saw the doctor to the door, while talk- 
ing to him in a low voice, and the doctor had a grave 
air. 

“No! No! Madame, not all is lost yet. Calm 
yourself.” 

“Ah! Doctor, save him, save my Jean!” 

“Only you can save him, because it is on account 
of you that he is dying!” 

“Ah! What can I do?... Tell me, doctor, 
please!” 

“You must love him, you must be good to him.” 

And Juliette threw herself into the arms of the 
physician : 

“No! It’s you I love! ... Come!” 

She dragged him, clinging to his lips. . and in the 
bedroom they danced and jumped to the ceiling and 
fell on my bed, enlaced. 

“Die, my Jean, please die! Ah! Why does it take 
you so long to die?” 

I fell into a slumber. When I awoke it was broad 
daylight. Buses were again rolling on the street, 
hawkers were screaming out their morning yells; I 
heard the scratching of a broom sweeping against my 
door in the hallway where people were passing. 

I went out, and proceeded in the direction of the 


CALVARY 249 


Rue de Balzac. As a matter of fact I had no other 
intention than to see Juliette’s house, to look into 
its windows and perhaps come across Celestine or 
Mother Souchard. .... More than twenty times I 
passed back and forth on the sidewalk, in front of it. 
The windows of the dining room were open, and I 
could see the copper plates which were shining in the 
shadow. A rug was hanging from the balcony. The 
windows of the bedroom were closed. What was 
there behind these closed shutters, behind this white 
impenetrable wall? A disarranged, untidy bed, the 
heavy odor of carnal passion, and two outstretched 
bodies asleep. The body of Juliette. . . and who else? 
The body of Mr. Everybody. . . . A body that Juliette 
had picked up casually under a cabaret table or on 
the street! They were asleep, sated with lust! The 
caretaker came to shake the rug on the sidewalk. I 
walked away, for ever since I had left the apartment 
I avoided the mocking glance of this old woman, I 
blushed every time my eyes met hers, bulging and 
vicious, seeming to jeer at my misfortune. . .. When 
she was finished I returned to the place and stood 
there for a long time to fret against this wall behind 
which something horrible was going on and which 
guarded the cruel mystery of a sphinx crouched upon 
the sky. Suddenly, as if struck by thunder, a mad 
fury shook me from head to foot and, without realiz- 
ing what I was going to do, without even thinking of 
it, I entered the house, went up the stairway and rang 
at Juliette’s door. It was Mother Souchard who 
opened the door for me. 

“Tell Madame,” I shouted, “tell Madame that I 
want to see her immediately, I want to speak to her. 
Also tell her that if she does not come out I’ll go and 
find her myself, I’ll drag her out of her bed, do you 
hear! Tell her. .. .” 


250 CALVARY 


Mother Souchard, pale and trembling, stammered 
out: 

“Why, my poor Monsieur Mintié, Madame isn’t in 
there. Madame has not come back... .” 

“Take care, you old sorceress! Don’t try to make 
a fool out of me! And do as I tell you or I'll kill and 
smash everybody and everything — Juliette, you, the 
furniture, the house.” 

The old servant raised her arms to the ceiling in 
bewilderment. 

“T swear to you by the Lord! She has not come 
back yet, Monsieur Mintié! Go into her bedroom and 
see for yourself! I am telling you!” 

In two bounds I was in the bedroom. . . the bed- 
room was empty. .. the bed had not been touched. 
Mother Souchard followed every step I made, repeat- 
ing: 

“See, Monsieur Mintié! See! Because you are no 
longer together. At this hour! .. .” 

I passed into the dressing room. Everything was in 
order just as it had been when we used to come home 
late at night. Juliette’s things were lying on the sofa, 
a boiler full of water was on the gas stove. 

“And where is she?” I asked. 

“Ah! Monsieur,” Mother Souchard replied, “does 
anybody know where Madame goes? There was a man 
here this morning who looked like some kind of a 
valet and spoke to Celestine, and then Celestine went 
out taking with her a change of clothes for Madame. 
... That’s all I know!” 

While prowling in the study I found the card which 
I had sent her the day before. 

“ Did Madame read this?” 

“ Probably not.” 

“ And you don’t know where she is?” 


CALVARY 251 


“ Why, I am sure I don’t know. Madame never tells 
me her affairs.” 

I went back to the bedroom, seated myself on a 
long couch. 

_ “All right, Madame Souchard. I am going to wait 

here. And let me tell you that something funny is 

going to happen! Ha! Ha! In the end, you see, 

Mother Souchard, this thing is bound to come to a 

head. I have been patient long enough. I have been. 
. Well, that’s enough!” 

I shook my fist in the air. 

“And it is going to be very funny, Mother 
Souchard!. . . and you'll be able to brag about having 
taken part in something very funny, something you'll 
never forget, never! You'll dream about it at night 
with terror, so help me God!” 

“Oh! Monsieur Mintié! Monsieur Mintié, ” the old 
woman implored. “For the love of God calm your- 
self. Go away! You'll commit a crime as sure as I 
live! And what is it you are going to do, Monsieur 
Mintié? What are you going to do?” 

At this moment, Spy, having come out of his cor- 
her, was advancing toward me, shaking his back, danc- 
ing on his hind legs like those of a spider. And I 
looked at Spy persistently. I was thinking that Spy 
was the only creature that Juliette loved, that to kill 
Spy would be to inflict the greatest sorrow on Juliette! 
The dog raised its paws toward me and tried to get 
on my lap. He seemed to say: 

“Even if you do suffer so much, I am not to blame 
for it. To avenge yourself on me—so small, so 
feeble, so trustful, would be cowardly. And then you 
think she really loves me so much! I amuse her as a 
plaything, I serve as a distraction for her for a moment 
and that is all. If you kill me now she will get an- 
other little dog like me this very evening, one whom 


252 CALVARY 


she will call Spy as she did me and whom she will 
overwhelm with caresses as she did me, and nothing 
will be changed!” 

I did not heed Spy any more than I heeded any of 
the voices that spoke within me whenever evil was 
drawing me on to commit some reprehensible deed. 

Brutally, ferociously I seized the little dog by his 
hind legs. 

“ Here is what I am going to do, Mother Souchard!” 
I shouted. “ Look!” 

And hurling Spy into the air with all my force so 
that he turned over several times, I crashed his head 
against the corner of the fireplace. Blood streamed 
all over the looking-glass and the hangings, bits of 
brains stuck to the candlesticks and a torn-out eye 
fell on the carpet. 

“What am I going to do, Mother Souchard?” I re- 
peated, flinging the cadaver into the middle of the 
bed upon which a pool of blood appeared. “ What am 
I going to do? Ha, Ha! You see this blood, this eye, 
these brains, this cadaver, this bed! Ha, Ha! Well, 
that’s what I am going to do to Juliette, Mother 
Souchard! That’s what I am going to do to Juliette, 
do you hear me, you old drunkard!” 

“Ah! for the life of me!” Mother Souchard stam- 
mered out, terrified. For the life of the good Lord, 
Ng eee 

She did not finish. With bulging eyes, her mouth 
wide open and distorted into a horrible grimace, she 
was staring at the black body on the bed and at the 
blood absorbed by the bed clothes, the red stain on 
which was becoming purple and larger. 


CHAPTER XII 


HEN I regained my senses, the killing of 

W Spy appeared to me a monstrous crime. 
I was as horrified as if I had killed a 

child. Of all the cowardly acts committed I thought 
that was the most cowardly and loathsome! To 
kill Juliette! That would have been a crime, of 
course, but perhaps there could be found, if not 
an excuse, at least a reason for that crime in the 
revolt of my anguish. But to kill Spy! A dog... 
a poor, inoffensive creature! Why? For no other 
reason than that I was a brute, that I had in me the 
savage and irresistible instinct of a murderer! Dur- 
ing the war I had killed a man who was kindly, young 
and strong, and I had killed him just at the moment 
when, fascinated, with beating heart, he was raptur- 
ously watching the rising sun! I had killed him while 
hidden behind a tree, concealed by the shadow, like 
a coward! He was a Prussian? What difference does 
it make! He, too, was a human being, a man like my- 
self, better than myself. Upon his life were depend- 
ing the feeble lives of women and children; a portion 
of suffering humanity was praying for him, waiting 
for him; perhaps in that virile youth, in that robust 
body that was his, he had the germs of those superior 
beings for whom humanity had been living in hope? 
And with one shot from an idiotic, trembling gun I 
had destroyed all that. And now I killed a dog! ... 
and killed it when it was coming toward me, when 
it was trying with its little paws to climb on my lap! 
Verily, I was an assassin! That small cadaver haunted 
me, I always saw that head hideously crushed, the 


254 CALVARY 


blood squirting all over the white clothes of the bed- 
room, and the bed indelibly stained with blood. 

What was also tormenting was the thought that 
Juliette would never forgive me the loss of Spy. She 
would be horrified at the mere sight of me. I wrote 
her letters of repentance, assured her that from now on 
I was going to be satisfied with what little attention 
she might give me, that I would never again com- 
plain, that I was not going to reproach her for her 
behavior; my letters were so humble, so self-degrad- 
ing, so vilely submissive that a person other than 
Juliette would feel disgusted on reading them. I sent 
them with a messenger whose return I would anxious- 
ly await on the corner of the Rue de Balzac. 

“ No answer!” 

“ Are you sure you did not give it to the wrong 
person? Did you deliver it to the party on the first 
floor?” 

“Yes, Monsieur. The maid even said to me: ‘No 
answer!’” 

I went to her house. The door was opened only 
to the extent allowed by the chain lock which Juliette, 
fearing me, had ordered put on, since the evening of 
that terrible scene; and through the half-opened space 
I could see the mocking and cynical face of Celestine. 

“ Madame is not in!” 

“ Celestine, my good Celestine, let me in, please!” 

“ Madame is not in!” 

“Celestine! My dear little Celestine. Let me go 
in and wait for her. I’ll give you a lot of money.” 

“ Madame is not in!” 

“ Celestine, I beg of you! Go and tell Madame that 
I am here, that I am all right now. . . that I am very 
sick. . . that I am going to die! And you shall have 
a hundred francs, Celestine. . . two hundred francs!” 

Celestine looked at me slyly, with a mocking air, 


CALVARY 255 


happy to see me suffer, happy above all to see a man 
reduced to her own level, begging servilely to her. 

“For just one minute, Celestine. I'll just look at 
her and go away!” 

“No, no, Monsieur! She’ll scold me!” 

The ringing of a bell was heard. I heard the noise 
of it quicken. 

“You see, Monsieur, she is calling me!” 

“Well, now! Celestine, tell her that if she does not 
come to my house by six o’clock, if she does not write 
to me by six o’clock. . . tell her that Iam going to kill 
myself! Six o’clock, Celestine! Don’t forget now. . . 
tell her that I am going to kill myself!” 

“ All right, Monsieur!” 

The door was shut behind me with the clang of a 
chained lock. 

It occurred to me to see Gabrielle Bernier, to tell 
her my troubles, to ask her advice, and use her offices 
for a reconciliation with Juliette. Gabrielle was finish- 
ing breakfast with a friend of hers, a short, skinny 
woman of dark complexion, with a pointed chin like 
a mouse which when speaking seemed always to be 
nibbling at something. In a morning robe of white 
silk, soiled and rumpled, her hair kept from falling by 
a comb stuck across it on top of her head, her elbows 
resting on the table, Gabrielle was smoking a cigarette 
and sipping chartreuse from a glass. 

“Why, Jean! And so you have come back?” 

She showed me into her dressing room which was 
very untidy. At the very first words which I spoke 
of Juliette, she exclaimed: 

“Why. . . don’t you know? We have not been on 
speaking terms for two months since the time she 
beat me out of a consul, my dear, an American Consul, 
who paid me five thousand a month! Yes, she beat 


256 CALVARY 


me out of it, that skinflint did! And how about you? 
You have made her come down a peg lower, I hope.” 

“ Ah! I!” I answered, “Iam very unhappy! And so 
a consul is her lover now!” 

Gabrielle relit her extinguished cigarette and 
shrugged her shoulders. 

“Her lover! Do you think women like that can 
keep a lover! She could not keep the Lord himself, my 
dear! Ah, men don’t stick to her very long, I tell you. 
They come one day and then the next they pitch camp 
somewhere else. Well, thanks very much! It’s all 
right to fleece them but you must do it with your 
gloves on, don’t you think? And you are still in love 
with her, poor boy.” 

“ Still—- why I am more so than ever! I have done 
everything to cure myself of this shameful infatua- 
tion which makes me the lowest of men, which kills 
me, but I can’t. Well now, she is leading a loathsome 
life, isn’t she?” 

“Ah! Well... that’s true,” Gabrielle exclaimed, 
blowing a cloud of smoke in the air. “ You know that 
I myself don’t play the prude. I am enjoying myself 
just like everybody else. . . but honestly. ..I can 
swear. .. . I’d feel ashamed to do what she does!” 

With head turned, she was emitting coils of smoke 
which rose tremblingly toward the ceiling. And to 
emphasize what she had just said: 

“That’s the truth I am telling you,” she repeated. 

Although I suffered cruelly, although every word 
of Gabrielle cut my heart as with a knife, I came up 
to her and coaxingly: 

“Come, my little Gabrielle,” I begged her, “ tell me 
all about her!” 

“Tell you! .. tell you! Wait now! You know 
the two Borgsheim brothers. . . those two dirty Ger- 
mans! Well, Juliette was with both of them at the 


CALVARY 257 


same time. I saw that myself, you know! At the same 
time, mind you, my dear! One night she said to one 
of them: ‘Ah well! It is you that I love!’ And she 
led him away. The next day she said to the other: 
‘No, it is positively you!’ And she led him away. 
And you should have seen them! Two wretched 
Prussians who haggled over the bill! And a lot of 
other things. But I don’t want to tell you anything 
because I see I hurt you.” 

“No!” I exclaimed, “no, Gabrielle, go on, because. 
... you understand. After all the disgust. . . the 
disgust... .” 

I was choking. I burst into sobs. 

Gabrielle was trying to console me. 

“Come! Come now. ... Poor Jean! Don’t cry! 
She does not deserve all this grief! Such a nice boy 
as you are! I can’t see how that is possible! I always 
used to tell her: ‘You don’t understand him, my 
dear, you never did understand him, a man like that 
is a jewel!’ Ah! I know some women who would 
be mighty glad to have a man like you. . . and who 
would love you very much!” 

She sat down on my lap and wanted to dry the tears 
from my eyes. Her voice became soft and her eyes 
luminous: 

“ Have a little courage. Cut loose from her! Get 
another one, one who is kind and gentle, one who 
would understand you. Can’t you see?” 

And suddenly, she threw her arms around me and 
fastened her mouth upon my own. Her bare breast 
which rolled out from under the lace of her peignoir 
was pressing against my chest. This kiss, this ex- 
posed portion of her body horrified me. I freed my- 
self from her embrace, I rudely pushed Gabrielle away, 
she straightened up again somewhat abashed, fixed 
her dress and said to me: 


258 CALVARY 


“Yes, I understand! I have had the same feeling. 
But, you know, dear. Whenever you want to... 
come to see me.” 

I left. My legs were shaking, around my head I 
felt rings of lead; a cold sweat covered my face and 
rolled in titillating drops down my back. In order 
to walk I had to hold on to the house walls, as I was 
on the verge of fainting. I walked into a café and 
avidly gulped down a few draughts of rum. I could 
not say that I suffered much. It was a sort of stupor 
that rendered my members inactive, a kind of physical 
and mental prostration in which from time to time 
the thought of Juliette brought with it the sensation of 
a sharp, lancinating odor. And in my disordered 
mind Juliette was losing her identity; it was no 
longer a woman who had an individual existence 
that I saw, it was prostitution itself with its im- 
mense, outstretched body covering the entire world; 
it was lust personified, eternally defiled, toward which 
panting multitudes were rushing across the shadow 
of woeful nights, pierced by torches carried by mon- 
strous idols. ...I1 remained there a long time, my 
elbows on the table, my head buried in my hands, 
with gaze fixed between two mirrors upon a panel on 
which flowers were painted. 

At last I left the café and walked. and walked 
ahead, without knowing where I was going. After 
a long course and without the least intention of 
getting there, I found myself in the Avenue 
Bois-de-Boulogne, near the Arc de Triomphe. The 
sun was beginning to set. Above the hills of Saint 
Cloud which took on a violet tinge, the sky was 
a glorious purple, and little pink clouds were wander- 
ing upon the pallid blue expanse. The woods stood 
out as a solid mass, grown darker, a fine dust reddened 
by the reflection of a setting sun rose from the avenue 


CALVARY 259 


black with carriages. And the dense mass of carriages, 
congested into interminable lines, were passing with- 
out end, carrying human birds of prey to nocturnal 
earnages. Reclining on their cushions, indolent and 
disdainful, with stupid countenances and flabby flesh, 
exhaling a putrid odor, they were all there, so nearly 
alike that I recognized Juliette in each one of them. 
The line of vehicles appeared to me more lugubrious 
than ever. As I looked at these horses, this diversity 
of colors, this crimson sun which made the glass panes 
of the carriages shine like breastplates, all this in- 
tense intermingling of colors—red, yellow, blue — 
all these plumes that swayed in the wind, I had the 
impression of looking at some enemy regiments, regi- 
ments of an army of conquest ready to fall upon van- 
quished foes, drunk foes, drunk with a desire for 
pillage. And quite seriously I was indignant over 
the fact that I did not hear the roar of cannons, did 
not hear the- mitrailleuses spitting death and sweep- 
ing the avenue with fire. A laborer who was returning 
from work stopped at the end of the sidewalk. With 
tools on his shoulder and crooked back, he was watch- 
ing the street. Not only did he have no hatred in his 
eyes but there was a sort of ecstasy in them. Anger 
seized me. I wanted to come up to him, grab him by 
the collar and cry out: 

“What are you doing here, you fool? Why do you 
look at these women so? These women who are an 
insult to your torn coat, to your arms trembling with 
fatigue, to your whole wretched body emaciated by 
daily hardships! In the days of revolution you 
thought you could avenge yourself upon society which 
kept you down by killing soldiers and priests, humble 
and suffering human beings like yourself? And you 
never thought of erecting scaffolds for these infamous 
creatures, for these ferocious beasts who steal from you 


260 CALVARY 


your bread, your sun. Look! Society which is so cruel 
to you, which tries to make ever heavier the 
chains that hold you riveted to eternal misery, that 
society offers them protection and riches; the drops of 
your blood it transforms into gold with which to 
cover the flabby bosoms of these despicable creatures. 
It is in order that they may live in palaces that you 
are spending your strength, that you are dying from 
hunger or that they break your head on the barricades. 
Look! When you beg for bread on the streets the 
police beat you with clubs, you poor wretch! But see 
how they make way for their coachmen and horses! 
Look! What a juicy grape-gathering they have! Ah! 
these vintage tubs of blood! And how on earth can 
the pure wheat grow tall and nourishing in the soil 
where these creatures rot!” 

Suddenly I saw Juliette. I saw her for a second, in 
profile. She wore a pink hat, looked fresh, was smil- 
ing; she seemed happy. Answering greetings with a 
slow motion of her head, Juliette did not see me. ... 
She passed on. 

She is going to my house! She has come back to 
her senses. She is going to my house! 

I was sure of it. An empty carriage passed by. I 
went in. Juliette had disappeared. 

“Tf I could only get there at the same time she 
does. For I know she is going to my house! Hurry 
up, driver, hurry up!” 

There is no carriage in front of the door of the fur- 
nished house. Juliette is already gone. I rushed down 
to the caretaker. 

“Was there someone here a minute ago asking about 
me? Was it a lady? Mme. Juliette Roux?” 

“Why no, Monsieur Mintié.” 

“Well, is there a letter for me?” 

“Nothing, Monsieur Mintié. ” 


CALVARY 261 


I was thinking: 

“ She’ll be here in a minute!” 

I waited. No one came! I continued waiting. No- 
body came! Time passed. And still no one came! 

“The contemptible creature! And she was still 
smiling! And she looked gay! And she knew that I 
was going to kill myself at six o’clock!” 

I ran to the Rue de Balzac. Celestine assured me 
that Madame had just gone out. 

“ Listen, Celestine, you are a nice girl. I like you 
very much. Do you know where she is? Go and find 
her and tell her that I want to see her.” 

“ But I don’t know where Madame is.” 

“Yes, you do, Celestine. I implore you. Please 
go! I suffer so!” . 

“Upon my word of honor! Monsieur, I don’t know 
where she is.” 

I insisted: 

“Perhaps she is at her lover’s? At the restaurant. 
Oh, tell me where she is! .. .” 

“ But I don’t know!” 

I was getting impatient. 

“Celestine, I have been trying to be nice to you. 
Don’t make me lose my temper. . . because. . . .” 

Celestine crossed her arms, shook her head and in 
the drawling voice of a blackguard: 

“ Because what? Oh, I am getting tired of you, you 
miserable wretch, you! And if you don’t betake your- 
self from here in a hurry, I am going to call the police, 
do you hear?” 

And pushing me rudely toward the door she added: 

“Yes, I mean it! These sluts here are worse than 
dogs!” 

I had sense enough not to start a quarrel with 
Celestine and, burning with shame, I went down the 
stairway. 


262 CALVARY 


It was midnight when I returned to the Rue de 
Balzac. I had gone through several restaurants, my 
eyes seeking Juliette in the mirrors, through curtain 
openings. I had gone into a few theatres. At the 
Hippodrome where she used to go on subscription 
days I had made a search of the stalls. This large 
place, with its dazzling lights, above all, this orchestra 
which played a slow and languid air —all this had un- 
strung my nerves and made me cry! I had approached 
groups of men, thinking that they might be talking 
about Juliette and that I might perhaps learn some- 
thing. And every time I saw a man dressed in evening 
clothes, I had said to myself: 

“ Perhaps that’s her lover!” 

What was I doing here? It seemed it was my fate 
to run after her everywhere, always, to live on the 
sidewalk, at the door of evil places and wait for 
Juliette! Exhausted with fatigue, a buzzing sensation 
in my head, unable to find a trace of Juliette, I had 
found myself on the street again. And I was waiting! 
For what? Really, I did not know. I was waiting 
for everything and nothing at the same time. I was 
there either to bring myself as a voluntary offering 
once more or to commit some crime. I was hoping 
that Juliette would come home alone. Then I thought 
I would go up to her and move her to pity with my 
words. I was also afraid I might see her in the com- 
pany of a man. Then I would perhaps kill her. But 
I was not premeditating anything. I had simply come 
here, that’s all! To surpise her all the better, I hid 
myself in the shadow of the door of the house next to 
her own. 

From there I could observe everything without 
being seen, if it were necessary not to show myself. 
I did not have to wait very long. A hackney coach 
coming from Faubourg Saint Honoré, passed into the 


CALVARY 263 


Rue de Balzac, crossed the street diagonally to the 
side where I was standing and, grazing the sidewalk, 
stopped in front of Juliette’s house! I held my breath, 
My whole body trembled, shaken by convulsions. 
Juliette came out first. I recognized her at once. She 
ran across the sidewalk and I heard her pull the handle 
of the door bell. Then a man came out; it seemed to 
me that I knew the man also. He came to the lamp 
post, searched in his pocketbook and awkwardly took 
out a few silver pieces which he examined by the light 
with upraised arm. And his shadow upon the ground 
assumed an angular and monstrous form! I wanted 
to rush out of my place of hiding. Something heavy 
held me nailed to the ground. I wanted to shout. The 
cry was throttled in my throat. At the same time a 
chill rose from my heart to my brains. I had a feeling 
as though life were slowly leaving my body. I made 
a superhuman effort and with tottering steps I went 
toward the man. The door was opened and Juliette 
disappeared through it, saying: 

“Well, are you coming?” 

The man was still searching in his pocketbook. 

It was Lirat! Had the houses, the very sky crashed 
upon my head my astonishment would have been no 
greater! Lirat going home with Juliette. That could 
not be! I had lost my senses! I came still closer. 

“ Lirat!” I cried out, “ Lirat! .. .” 

He had paid the coachman and looked at me, terri- 
fied! Motionless, with gaping mouth, with outspread 
legs he was looking at me, without saying a word! 

“Lirat! Is that you? It is not possible! It is not 
you, is it? You look like Lirat but you are not Lirat!” 

Lirat was silent... . 

“Come, Lirat! You are not going to do that. . . or 
I shall say that you have sent me away to Ploch in 
order to steal Juliette from me! You here, with her! 


264 CALVARY 


Why that’s preposterous! Lirat! Remember what you 
told me about her. . . think of the beautiful things 
which you had planted in my soul. This despicable 
woman! Why she is good only for one like me who 
am lost. But you! You are an honorable man, you are 
a great artist! Is it to revenge yourself on me that 
you are doing this? A man like you does not revenge 
himself in such a manner! He does not besmirch him- 
self! If I did not come to see you it was because I 
feared to incur your anger! Come, speak to me, Lirat. 
Answer me!” 

Lirat was silent. Juliette was calling him in the 
hallway: 

“Well, are you coming?” 

I seized Lirat’s hands: 

“Look here Lirat. . . she is mocking you. Don’t 
you understand it? One day she said to me: ‘I shall 
revenge myself on Lirat for his contempt, for his 
arrogant harshness! And that will be a farce!’ She 
is having that revenge now. You are going into her 
house, aren’t you. . . and tomorrow, tonight, this very 
minute, perhaps, she will chase you out in disgrace! 
Yes, that is what she is after, I can swear! Ah! Now 
I understand it all! She has pursued you! Foolish 
as she is, infinitely inferior to you as she is, she has 
known how to turn your head. She has a genius 
for evil, and you are chaste in body and mind! She 
has poured poison into your veins. But you are strong! 
You can’t do this after all that has taken place be- 
tween us. . . . or else you are a depraved man, a dirty 
pig, you whom I admire! You are a dirty pig! Come 
now!” 

Lirat suddenly wriggled out of my hold, and, push- 
ing me away with his two clenched fists: 

“Well, yes!” he shouted, “I am a dirty pig! Leave 
me alone!” 


CALVARY 265 


A dull noise was heard which resounded in the air 
like a thunderbolt. It was the door shut after Lirat. 
The houses, the sky, the lights of the street were in 
a whirl. And I no longer saw anything. I stretched 
out my arms in front of me and fell on the sidewalk. 
Then in the midst of peaceful cornfields I saw a road, 
a white road upon which a man, seemingly tired, was 
walking. The man never stopped looking at the beau- 
tiful corn which ripened in the sun, and at the broad 
meadows where flocks of gamboling sheep grazed, 
their snouts buried in the grass. Apple-trees stretched 
out to him their branches weighted down with the 
purple fruit, and the springs purled at the bottom of 
their moss-covered recesses in the ground. He seated 
himself upon the bank of a river covered at this spot 
with little fragrant flowers, and listened rapturously 
to the music of nature. . . . From everywhere voices 
which rose up from the earth, voices which came down 
from heaven, soft voices were murmuring: “ Come 
to me all ye who suffer, all ye who have sinned. We 
are the comforters who will restore to wretched peo- 
ple their repose of life and their peace of conscience. 
Come to us all ye who wish to live!” And the man 
with arms uplifted to heaven prayed: “Yes, I wish to 
live! What must I do in order not to suffer? What 
must I do in order not to sin?” The trees shook their 
crowns, the corn field moved its sea of stubble, a buzz- 
ing arose from every grass blade, the flowers swayed 
their little corollas on top of their stems, and from 
all this a unique voice was heard: “ Love us!” said the 
voice. The man resumed his walk, birds were flutter- 
ing all around him. 

The next day I bought a suit of working clothes. 

“ And so Monsieur is going away! ” asked the errand 
boy of the premises to whom I had just given my old 
clothes. 


266 CALVARY EARN 2 See lane gt 


“Yes, my friend!” 

“And where is Monsieur going?” 

“T don’t know.” 

On the street, men appeared to me like mad ghosts, 
old skeletons out of joint, whose bones, badly strung 
together, were falling to the pavement with a strange 
noise. I saw the necks turning on top of broken spinal 
columns, hanging upon disjointed clavicles, arms sun- 
dered from the trunks, the trunks themselves losing 
their shape. And all these scraps of human bodies, 
stripped of their flesh by death, were rushing upon 
one another, forever spurred on by a homicidal fever, 
forever driven by pleasure, and they were fighting over 
foul carrion. 


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